


Lost Templar in Skyhold

by barbex



Series: Out of the shadow, into the mess [1]
Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: F/M, Hawke twins live, Inquisitor Carver Hawke, Mage Hawke (Dragon Age), canon is merely a guideline, no beta we die like men
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-08-16
Updated: 2019-06-14
Packaged: 2019-06-28 10:48:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 16
Words: 48,582
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15705711
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/barbex/pseuds/barbex
Summary: Leaving Kirkwall behind, Carver Hawke soon finds finds himself in a hot new mess with a glowing green mark on his hand. Apparently he is the Inquisitor now? The Herald of Andraste?What will Merrill think of all that? Or his sisters?





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> So this is a thing now. The idea was to see Carver as the world's most reluctant Inquisitor and Merrill asking this Solas fellow some hard questions.

* * *

 

Sometimes, big events start with small little words.

"Seeker Pentaghast has asked me to join her, to serve under her to form a new Inquisition." Cullen drops that on him just as he and Carver are sitting on the remains of the chantry ruin in the middle of Kirkwall. They often take their supper here, on a boulder that used to be part of the chantry's gate.

"So you're just gonna leave?" Carver shouts, his quick temper flaring up. The stale bread with the rockhard cheese hovers halfway between his mouth and quite frankly the ground because it looks inedible.

"Why stay?" Cullen stretches out his arm to encompass the remains of destruction around them. "We have no chantry, the Circle of Kirkwall is deserted, the few mages who are left would be better off living in the Hanged Man than on the Gallows. And I'm..." He slumps forward, resting his head in his hands. "I'm tired of pretending that we still do good here."

Carver can't argue with that. As if the destruction of the chantry had been a signal to every vile urge and bad temper in the templars, his comrades had taken to the streets in a rampage that Cullen and him had barely been able to put a stop to. Ever since then, they've lost handful of templars every day. They just packed up and left.

"There's what? Twenty templars left?" Cullen asks.

"At the most." Carver lets out a snort. "I haven't counted since yesterday." He finally gives up on the bread and throws it to a couple of mice who immediately start fighting over the cheese. It's like the city brings out the worst in every creature.

"Just, let them take a year's supply of lyrium and be on their way. Maybe another circle needs them. I'm... I'm just so tired." Cullen, former Knight Captain, now Knight Commander of the Kirkwall Templar Order, sighs. "Seeker Pentaghast wants to end this war, that at least is a noble cause to fight for."

"And what about me?" Carver blurts out. It's not that he particularly liked the chantry and the Gallows but at least he felt like he did something important. He protected his sisters and their friends. In a way he also protected the apostate mage Anders but he doesn't dwell on that thought, he rather lingers a bit on another apostate mage, Merrill.

"You're coming with me of course," Cullen says.

Carver quickly shoves all thoughts of Merrill's soft lips aside and stares at Cullen. "I'm coming with you? Says who? I'd rather stay here, I can still help Aveline. I might even join the city guard." And he would stay close to Merrill.

"City Guard doesn't have Lyrium."

"I'll think of something, Varric will know where to get it."

"Last I heard, Varric is also going to accompany the Seeker."

"Really? Never would have thought he'd leave Kirkwall."

Cullen grins. "I don't think it's all that voluntarily."

"That Seeker must be very impressive," Carver says "Some other dwarf then, Varric isn't the only one."

Cullen sighs once more and straightens. "As a matter of fact, the Seeker has asked for you specifically."

"Why me? Oh, wait, it's not about me, is it?" Carver scowls at him, resentment at forever being the second Hawke biting in his chest. "They're looking for Marian because of the chantry explosion. Does she think I'm going to just hand my sister over to her prosecution?"

Cullen's hand rubs his neck in that familiar gesture when he has to say something that he doesn't really want to say. "It seems that... the Inquisition needs a leader, the Inquisitor. They wanted the Warden-Commander at first but can't find them. So now, Seeker Pentaghast is looking for..." He stops, rubbing his temples as if the next sentence physically pains him. "She's looking for the Champion of Kirkwall to lead the Inquisition."

"Oh no," Carver whispers to himself. "Marian?" he says louder. "Are you serious? Did you tell her what kind of person my sister is?"

"The constant headache during my time as the Knight Captain? Yes I told her."

"And she still...?"

Cullen shrugs, his whole body a sign of defeat. "She thinks the Champion of Kirkwall is a marvelous hero who will inspire people to follow her."

"That's a terrible idea," Carver says quietly. "Very, very not good, terrible idea."


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Elven language:  
> Ma vhenan: My heart; a term of endearment.  
> Var lath vir suledin: Our love will endure.

"So we're not the Inquisition yet?" Carver stretches his legs and tries to ignore the pain in his thigh muscles. He hates riding horses. 

Seeker Pentaghast makes a noise he's been hearing often lately, a kind of throaty harumph that definitely doesn't mean anything positive. "The Divine will restore the Inquisition if she considers it to be necessary after the Conclave. I'm just presenting her the option."

"Mages and templars, finding a peaceful solution after all these years? Working together? I don't see that happening." Carver shakes his head. This fight, this war has been going on for years and no side is willing to understand the other. 

"An inspiring leader could draw people together..." Cassandra says, almost to herself but it's enough to have Carver nearly explode.

"For the last time, I don't know where my sisters are, I don't know where any of the mages from Kirkwall are. And I'm pretty sure the Champion of Kirkwall is long forgotten." He glares at the Seeker until the woman nods and turns away.

"Maybe you're right," Seeker Pentaghast says, her nevarran accent sharpening her speech. "I might be clinging to a hope that is unfounded. But this war can not be won, not by anyone. The Inquisition is our last hope to have an institution outside of the two warring factions, to act as a mediator."

"The Inquisition will still be formed by former templars," Carver says before he can stop himself.

Cassandra Pentaghast throws him a look that makes Carver want to sink into the ground until he hits the Deep Roads. "My hope is that some of the moderate mages are willing to join the Inquisition as well."

Cullen rides up to Carver's side, murmuring not loud enough for the Seeker to hear, "Lots of hope we're working with here."

The path winds around the mountain they've been climbing for the past hour and before them the impressive building of the Temple Of Sacred Ashes appears. The yard in front of it is filled to the brim with people and animals of all kinds. Carver can even see a few halla holding up their majestic horns.

"The Dalish are here?"

"Divine Justinia extended her invitation to the Conclave to all people in Thedas," the Seeker says, "since everyone is affected by this war."

Carver scans the crowd, for a moment wondering if he will find Merrill here. 

_"I don't want to leave you," he says, not saying what he meant to say. That he loves her, that she's the most amazing person he knows, that he knows she isn't an evil bloodmage, just, well, a bloodmage, that he loves her so much that imagining not being around her turns his world grey. "I don't know how long I have to stay here but I want to protect you and..."_

_"We can't stay here, you know it. It's time to go."_

_"But you could stay with me, instead of going on that ship with Isabela."_

_"I'll find you, ma vhenan." Merrill takes his hand and puts it against her cheek. "I'll find you again. Var lath vir suledin."_

He still doesn't know what that expression means. To him it meant farewell as Merrill climbed up the ramp to Isabela's ship. He could only wave once before Cullen and the Seeker called him back. They waited for him, his horse prancing on the reins, eyeing him suspiciously. 

The very same horse is now busy ripping grass from the side of the path, no matter how much Carver pulls on the reins and digs his heels in its side. "Go, you stupid ass," he snarls at it. 

Cullen, already halfway down the path, turns around, rides up to his side and smacks the horse on the back. The horse doesn't even lift its head, just starts walking, still ripping off grass. 

"I hate horses," Carver mumbles to himself. He's staring down the steep path, now unobstructed by horsehead and feels nauseous. He looks at the sky instead, breathing in deeply. 

_"All plants have a story to tell, ma vhenan. You can smell it in the air." She looks up to him, her beautiful eyes deep enough to drown. "You probably think that's silly."_

"No," he says quietly to himself, the memory constricting his chest. 

"What?" Cullen asks next to him. 

"Nothing, just... nothing. So, what exactly are we going to do there at the Conclave?" 

Cullen opens his mouth to speak but Seeker Pentaghast speaks first, without looking back to them. "You will just watch. You are not part of the templar order anymore and you do not speak for them or the Chantry."

"Wait, just me?" Carver asks. "Where will you be?" 

"I have other duties to attend to," the Seeker says. 

"Fine, I hope they have at least some food." Carver's horse has finally given up on the meager patches of grass and trots eagerly down towards the building, probably smelling the well stocked stables.

"Don't eat everything," Cullen says with a chuckle, "they might not be prepared for the appetite of a fereldan farmboy."

"I haven't seen a farm in years, you knobhead." 

The Seeker stops her horse abruptly and Carver scrambles with the reins to bring his own horse to a halt. Not an easy feat as the damn animal seems to be convinced that good things await it down there.

"We leave you now," the Seeker says. "Commander Cullen and I will be back in a few days." She hands a thick piece of paper over to him. "This will ensure your placement as an observer on all discussions. Please be respectful. I expect a report."

"Yes, Seeker." 

Cullen and the Seeker lead their horses up another path and soon disappear behind a massive rock formation. Carver's horse has enough of waiting and falls into a jog that almost shakes the teeth out of his mouth. He is only too happy to hand the beast over to the stable master.

Stepping out of the stable, awkwardly stretching his legs, he comes face to face with a halla and someone with a familiar accent calls out to him, "Watch it, shemlen!" 

The majestic halla stares him down, its nostrils quivering and Carver takes a careful step backwards. The rider glides down from its back, a tall elf with brown skin, wearing the same green colors that Merrill always wore. The elf whispers something to the halla and then steps aside, letting the animal walk away. It doesn't hurry and walks as if it knows how impressive it looks. 

"Won't he run away?" Carver wonders.

"He is a friend, he will come back. I do not force him." 

His accent sounds so familiar, Carver wonders if he is from Merrill's clan. But how can he ask him about that? He knows precious little about Merrill's dalish life, doesn't even know what her clan is called.

How could that happen? How could he know so very little about her and her life?

Before he can dwell longer on those depressing thoughts, a chantry sister welcomes him to the Conclave and gestures to him to step inside. The tall elf follows him, scowling at the chantry sister. 

Carver acknowledges him with a nod and slows down so that he doesn't walk behind him. 

"Are you part of a delegation?" the elf asks.

"No, I'm just here to observe." Carver stops in front of the statue of Andraste, quickly bowing his head in front of her. Then he turns to the elf, extending his hand. "My name is Carver."

"Siljan." He takes Carver's hand and studies him with quick, dark eyes. "Where are you from?" 

"I've lived in Kirkwall the last few years."

"I've been near Kirkwall, but I avoided entering the city."

"That was probably wise," Carver says with a sigh, "Can't really recommend the city, it's a cesspool, especially now, after the chantry explosion."

Siljan narrows his eyes. "That's a templar armor you're hiding under that coat."

Carver looks down on his chest and pulls the coat over the emblem on his breastplate. "Left the order, took the armor with me." 

"But you were a templar when the mage blew up the mage prison?"

"Mage prison? It was the chantry, not a prison." 

Siljan looks around, taking in the majestic arches, the lavish decorations and masses of candles. "So it was a place like this?"

"Yes."

"Why destroy a temple to your gods if mages are imprisoned elsewhere?" Siljan looks critically at the statue of Andraste.

"It was a symbol, I guess," Carver says with a shrug. "Of the oppression."

Siljan nods thoughtfully "That makes sense."

"Does it?" Carver looks at him in surprise.

"It may have been the templars, who hunted us down, but it was the Chantry who told them that it was the right thing to do." 

Carver feels his cheeks flush red. "I'm sorry."

Siljan looks at him, a smile pulling at his lips. "It was a long time ago. But it's still a useful bit of information to make templars feel uncomfortable."

Carver snorts out loudly, earning a critical look from a chantry sister. He turns his back to her and grins at Siljan. "Luckily, I'm not a templar anymore."

"Lucky indeed." He looks down to his feet, lowering his voice as he speaks. "So, if not for the templars, who are you observing for?"

"I'm not sure I'm allowed to tell you."

"How curious." 

A melody from a trumpet calls them to attention and to the admiring murmuring of the crowd, Divine Justinia steps out on the gallery overlooking the hall. 

"Welcome, travellers. I welcome you to this Conclave of peace, where we want to end the war that costs so many lives among us." 

She addresses the various groups down in the hall and welcomes them with kind words. The circle mages, clean and calm in shimmering robes, bow their heads to her. The rebel mages, in ragged clothes and armor, are less adoring, looking over their shoulders suspiciously, their staffs held at the ready. 

Next she welcomes the templar delegation and Carver stretches his neck to get a good look, to see if he recognizes anybody. But most of them wear their helmets and he doesn't know the Knight Commanders at the front. The Divine also acknowledges the various ambassadors in the crowd, mages, dwarves and elves and thanks the Valo-Kas mercenaries for providing security. 

Carver looks around, to see what kind of mercenary would be able to secure a volatile crowd as this and suddenly stands in front of a grey giant. He hardly ever has to look up to other people but the qunari in front of him looks down on him and scowls impressively. 

Siljan pulls at his sleeve and frees him from the vicious stare. "Carver, a question."

"You have many questions," Carver says, walking to the side with him, away from the grey giant. "What is it?"

"I don't know much about you Shemlens and your groups. But I have met Grey Wardens and I wonder why they aren't attending this Conclave."

"That's a good question," Carver says, searching the crowd for the Warden emblem. "The Wardens like to keep out of politics."

"How fortunate for them to be able to do that," Siljan says with a bite in his voice.

"It's a load of ramshit if you ask me. Keeping out of politics while this war is going on."

Siljan snickers at that.

Up front, the Divine sings a chant to the Maker, asking for his blessing. Several attendees join in and fill the hall with the chant. 

"Oh," Siljan says quietly. "I knew that Shemlens sing but I didn't know it could sound so nice."

"I know you dalish have beautiful songs." Carver doesn't know why he says this. Maybe because Siljan's accent reminds him so much of Merrill's. 

He gets a curious look from Siljan. "Not many Shemlens get to hear our songs."

Carver is about to tell him about Merrill when the door at their back slams open and a group of armored men and women flood in, lead by a tall, hooded person. 

"Oh, the Grey Wardens," he says, just as a red field of magic blasts out from the hooded figure and knocks him to the ground.

As he falls, he catches Siljan's eyes, wide in terror as he chokes on the magic holding him down. Carver tries to speak, even scream, but the magic is like a weight pressing down on his chest, trapping and strangling him.

He sees the Wardens climb up to the gallery, killing the chantry sisters in their path and then throwing the Divine over the railing into a magic field. A sickly green light stretches out from the hooded figure and grabs the screaming Divine. Carver raises his hand to do something, anything but then his world drowns in agony and noise as the sickly green light explodes around him.

"But the Wardens..." he whispers as his mind leaves him.

Sometimes, big events start with small little words.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Some game dialogue in this but don't worry, we won't follow that too closely.

* * *

"What's going on?"

"Run. Run, warn them!"

The world is green, dark in an unnatural way and an all too familiar sound makes him scramble to his feet. Hundreds of legs scurry over the ground and one look behind him confirms what he already knows -- spiders, huge spiders, their many eyes blinking at him. He runs, stumbling over uneven, unfamiliar ground. 

"Anybody here? Hello?" He keeps running, knowing deep in his heart that nothing around him is right. The light is wrong, the noises are hollow, the ground keeps shifting. But the spiders chase him up the hill, whatever hill it might be because it looks nothing like the Frostback Mountains they traveled through. 

The green light gets brighter as he runs towards it and a white, glowing figure appears. It looks like the silhouette of a chantry sister, her head garp shining white on her head. She stretches out her hand and he runs up to grab it. But the ground shifts and he falls to his knees. The spiders are getting closer and he crawls towards the woman. Her light reaches his hand and his world explodes in white again.

He wakes in darkness, rough stones under his knees. His hands are bound in shackles, kept apart by a bar and his left hand burns. 

The burning intensifies, startling him awake as he stares at a green fire engulfing his fist. 

"Tell me why we shouldn't kill you right away?" a woman says behind him.

"What? Where am I?"

"Do you know what happened?" the woman says, her face still hidden in the shadow of a hood. She has a warm voice that barely hides the steel under it.

"Happened? Why am I shackled?" Carver tries to free his hands but the more he moves, the brighter his hand flares in green, pain burning up his arm. Hissing through his teeth, he holds up his hand. "What have you done to me?"

"Do you remember the explosion?"

"What explosion?"

"Our Most Holy, Divine Justinia, is dead."

This voice he knows and a look over his shoulder confirms that this is Seeker Cassandra Pentaghast. Her expression is even more grim than usual and her voice wavers with pain. "The Divine is dead. Everyone at the Conclave is dead. Except for you."

"But... all those people." There were hundreds of people in that great room, humans, dwarves, qunari, elves. Siljan, whose accent reminded him so much of Merrill. If Merrill had come with him... 

Seeker Pentaghast grabs his cape and pulls her close to her face. "Why were you spared?" 

"I don't know."

"What happened at the temple?"

Carver tries to recall the temple, the people watching the Divine, her speech, Siljan asking his questions and then — something pressed him down, the Divine trapped, then bathed in light, a poisonous green around him, spiders, a voice...

A burning pain bites into his hand as it flares up in sickly green light. It feels like holding his hand into burning coals and he cries out. "What is this?" 

"We don't know," the hooded woman says.

"But it's killing you," Seeker Pentaghast says.

Carver stares at his hand. It seems to be a foreign object, like a parasite, that has attached itself to him and as he watches, green light crawls under his skin and up his arm like veins. "Please, get this off me." He looks at the hooded woman but she turns her head away.

The Seeker shakes his shoulder, making the manacles grate against the skin of his wrists. "What happened?"

"I don't know, I had nothing to do with it!"

The Seeker pulls her sword from her back and holds it to his throat, her eyes alight in anger. "I don't believe you!"

"Cassandra," the hooded woman says warmly, "we need him."

"Need me for what?"

"It will be easier to show you." Seeker Pentaghast pulls him up and removes the manacles. Instead, his wrists get bound with a rope, his green burning hand pressed against the other. Strangely, the green fire doesn't burn his other hand though, it even feels kind of cold.

The Seeker leads him outside. It's freezing, much colder than it was when they got here. There is even snow on the ground and Carver blinks against the blinding whiteness. But something makes the hairs on the back of his neck stand up and as he follows the line of sight of the other people, he stares into a green, glowing hole in the grey sky.

Like a maelstrom of green light and grey clouds, the hole in the sky eats the mountain under it, drawing up rocks and dust into its maw. 

"What is that?" Carver watches a tree fly up and disappear into the terrifying hole.

"We call it the Breach." The Seeker turns to him and then stares down to his hand. "The explosion at the temple caused it. It's a massive rift into the world of demons and it's not the only rift, just the largest one. Unless we act, the Breach will grow until it swallows the world." 

Carver hisses as the fire on his hand flares up in a green ball of light. The pain makes his knees buckle and he falls forward with a cry.

The Seeker gives him a pitiful look and kneels in front of him. "Your mark grows, each time the Breach expands. It is killing you." 

"Get it off me!"

"We have an advisor who thinks that the mark on your hand can close the Breach."

"I see, so that's what you need me for." The pain recedes to a low hum and he flexes his fingers as the green flames lick around his knuckles. He gets up to follow the Seeker through the people. Someone throws a rotten apple at him and when he looks around, many seem to ready something to throw at him but they stop when the Seeker raises her hand.

"They grieve for the Most Holy and they need someone to blame."

"So, if it weren't for this," he holds up his bound hands, "you'd have thrown me to the wolves by now?"

The Seeker sighs. "There will be a trial, I can promise that much."

"Great, I have something to look forward to then," Carver grumbles under his breath. "Seeker, you know me, we travelled here together with Cullen Rutherford and you just happened to send me into the temple because you were busy, does that sound like a solid plan for someone who wants to blow up the Conclave?"

The Seeker makes that annoyed sound in her throat.

"Granted, Kirkwall may have a reputation for blowing things up," Carver continues but stops when the Seeker makes that disgusted noise again. 

She turns to him and cuts his ropes. "Be careful. The Breach acts like a door to the Fade. Demons are pouring through it. We are fighting but there's too many of them."

Carver is glad that she mentioned that because the fire breathing demon that suddenly rises from the ground in front of him like a giant snail glowing coals would have been even more of a surprise otherwise.

"Maker's ass!" he yells out, jumping over a tipped over cart to get away from the thing. Even with his hands unbound, he is still defenseless and he grabs the next big piece of wood he can grab to hit the flaming monster with it. The wood goes up in flames as it hits the demon, hardly making an impact.

He looks around, desperate for anything to defend himself with. "Andraste's flaming arse," he swears under his breath. The Seeker is fighting two other demons, attacking them with her sword and shield, she can't help him. He scrambles back, throwing a damn apple at the creature when a glint catches his eye. Kicking at a pile of debris, he sees the pommel of a sword and grabs it.

The hot breath of the fiery sloth demon heats up his neck and he pulls the sword out and swings it around without even looking what kind it is. The sword is huge, even longer than the one he used to have. It cuts the demon in half and it falls with an inhuman shreek, its own flames consuming it. 

In the sudden silence, he hears footsteps behind him and whirls around. The Seeker holds her sword to his chest and snarls, "Drop your weapon, now."

"Seeker, a demon attacked me."

"You don't need to fight."

"Seriously?" Carver spreads his arms, pointing at the amount of ridiculousness around him, with a hole in the sky and green glowing ghosts floating in the distance. Any moment now, another demon could pop out from the ground. 

The Seeker lowers her sword and sighs. "You're right. I cannot protect you."

"You have to trust me."

"We'll see."

Carver makes sure that she isn't looking at him before he rolls his eyes. 

"Where are we going?" he asks as they run up a hill towards the noise of a fight.

"The Forward Camp. They need our help." The Seeker runs ahead, the sun symbol on the shield on her back glowing white in the eerie green light. 

The path leads up to a ruin but he can't tell how old it is, could be ancient, could be just recently destroyed. Under the grey sky, the snow reflecting the green light of the Breach, everything looks not quite real. 

In the middle of what used to be a courtyard, humans and demons are fighting around a large green, crystalline object. It is floating, moving, changing shape in ways that don't look natural, turning from swirling lights to crystalline shards and back in the blink of an eye. 

"Is that a rift?" Carver asks to empty air because the Seeker has already left his side and charges into battle. He hurries after her, readying the comically big sword. It feels not right in his hands but it cuts through the demons just fine. But as soon as he cuts one demon down, another comes through the rift, slithering towards him on flames. 

Green fire crackles on his hand and he almost drops his sword as his very veins burn. A demon slithers towards him, twice his size and fast and he pulls on the weight of the sword but it's too much, his hand doesn't want to keep holding on and the fiery breath of the creature licks at his skin — a massive bolt hits the demon from the side, practically cutting it in half. It crumbles to the side and the weight of his sword is enough that he can skewer its head with just one hand.

Carver turns, looking for his saviour and he can't believe his eyes. "Varric?"

"Quick, before more come through!" an unfamiliar voice calls out and someone grabs his arm and raises it towards the sickly green crystalline shape. The green flames swirl around his hand, faster and brighter, turning into a rope of lightning stretching up to the rift. The air smells of molten metal. A buzzing fills his head as the lightning turns brighter and when it touches the rift, everything seems to freeze for a moment before the rift explodes in blinding light. 

The buzzing in his ears stops abruptly, making him taste the silence. He stares at his hand and then at the man who held it up to the rift. "What did you do?"

"I did nothing, the credit is yours," the man says, a bald elf in rough, old clothing. He seems unassuming with his hunched shoulders, almost fragile, but he watches Carver's glowing hand with vigilant eyes.

"How did you know?"

The elf looks quite pleased with himself. "Whatever magic opened the Breach in the sky, also caused that mark on your hand. I theorized that the mark could also reverse the energy of the rift and close it again."

"You theorized?" Carver bristles and for once it has nothing to do with the fire on his hand. "So you didn't _know_? My arm also could have turned into charcoal or maggots for all you know? "

Some of the self assurance leaves the elf's face. "I considered that to be not likely. "

"Not likely?" Carver turns around. "Varric, what in the blazes is going on? "

The dwarf grins widely. "Fancy that you should turn to me for guidance, as I'm merely a prisoner, just like you."

The Seeker glares at him. "I wanted you to tell your story to the Divine, clearly, that is no longer possible. I told you that you are free to go."

"And yet, here I am, lucky for you, considering current events." He strokes over his crossbow. "Bianca just saved our friend here and it looks like he became really important."

"The mark could close the Breach like it closed the rift," the Seeker says. "There is hope for us yet."

"And here I thought we'd be ass deep in demons forever." Varric shoulders his crossbow and comes to Carver's side. 

"It seems," the Seeker says with an unusually soft voice, "that you hold the key to our salvation."

"My name is Solas," the bald elf says with a thin smile, "I'm glad to see you still live."

Varric grins at that. "What he means to say is, 'I kept that mark from killing you while you slept.'"

Carver is not ready to forgive the elf just yet. "That makes you an expert on my hand?"

The Seeker gestures towards the bald elf. "Solas is an apostate, well versed in such matters and the magic involved here."

"Technically, all mages are now apostates, Cassandra." The elf, Solas, tears his gaze away from Carver's glowing hand and looks up to him. "My travels have allowed me to see much of the Fade, far more than any Circle mage. I offer all the help I can give."

Carver wishes for Bethany to be here. She would know how to talk to this elf, put a damper on his self assurance and his dismissal of Circle mages. 

Solas ignores the glare Carver gives him. "If the Breach is not closed, we are all doomed, regardless of our origin. Cassandra, you should know, the magic here is unlike any I have ever seen. Your prisoner here is no mage — "

" — oh _now_ I'm a prisoner again?" Carver grumbles.

" — indeed I find it difficult to imagine any mage holding such power." 

"Understood," the Seeker says. Carver is still reeling from Solas casually calling her Cassandra.

"We must hurry to the Forward Camp," she says and jumps over a broken wall to a path leading around the mountain.

Solas gives him another thin smile. "I'm sure we can test you mark again along the way, the Breach has opened more rifts in its wake." He follows the Seeker and Carver waits for him to be out of earshot before he turns to Varric.

"...in its wake," he mocks.

Varric chuckles quietly. "Yes, he has a knack for the flourish that guy. Kind of surprising actually, never heard dalish elves talk like that." 

They climb over the broken wall and Varric looks up to him. "Hey, Junior, how are you holding up?"

Carver opens his mouth to snap at Varris for the old nickname but the familiarity of it is actually a relief. "I don't even know, I..." he holds up his hand with the green light glowing in its palm. "This is not what I had in mind when I joined Cullen and the Seeker for this Inquisition business."

"And..." Varric slows his steps to make the gap between them and the others larger. "What about Sunshine, Daisy, Hawke?"

"They all went on board with Isabela, about a month ago." He looks down to Varric. "You know, when you disappeared, it started to look really unsafe in Kirkwall. Hawke collected all the mages she could find and who were willing to go and she got Isabela a ship."

"And Merrill went with them?"

"Yes."

"And you didn't join them?" There is a hint of accusation in Varric's voice.

"Excuse me? I'm a templar! Vows and all. Back then, we still had a working templar order on the Gallows, I couldn't just leave," he says, his voice getting louder.

"Sorry," Varric says, lowering his voice. "I just... Seeker Cassandra took me prisoner and shipped me across Thedas and I couldn't do anything. All the news I got from Kirkwall were bad, and worse the next day. I was just worried, about all of you, Hawke, Merrill, Bethany..."

The way he says Bethany's name makes Carver look more closely at Varric's face. The dwarf seems unusually serious, a worry line carved deep between his brows. Carver makes a mental note of asking Varric about that some other time.

"A few days after they left, Cullen told me that the Seeker Pentaghast wanted him to join her new Inquisition."

"Huh, she had that planned?" Varric wonders. "I didn't know that."

"We left like 12 days later. By that point, only two mages were left in the Circle and they both found another place to stay." Carver flexes his fingers, his marked hand is itching.

"I didn't know you could just lock up the barracks and declare the templar order closed like that," Varric says. 

"Me neither. It felt like we were abandoning our post to be honest. But Cullen is — was technically my commanding officer, he could have ordered me to come with him. But he asked me and I..."

"You saw no reason to stay?"

Carver nods and flexes his fingers again, he can see now in the distance the reason for his itching hand: a rift is dancing on a frozen lake, surrounded by demons and ghostly wraiths again.

Varric pulls his crossbow from his shoulder and strokes lovingly over the polished wood. "Well, looks like there's work for us. Bianca is already excited."

Carver pulls the giant sword from his back and holds in front of him with both hands. The Seeker and Solas have already sped up their steps and Varric and him hurry to catch up to them.

"Tell me, Carver," Varric says as he slides three bolts into his crossbow, "the last two mages, where did they go when you closed the Circle?"

Carver sighs, of course Varric would pry on that question. "As far as I know, they've moved to work at the Blooming Rose." 

Varric laughs out. "You're kidding me. Circle mages? At the Blooming Rose? How would they even know... wasn't it your job to prevent them from, you know, making mage babies? How...?"

"Well, yeah, apparently they knew everything they needed to know."

Varric can't stop snickering. "I'm afraid that won't look good on your templar report card."

"Well, lucky for me, we locked that card place up too," Carver grumbles. "Will you shut it now? How about you shoot some demons?"

"Of course," Varric says, still snickering, "right away, Serah Salvation."

"I hate you, Varric." 

"Naw, you're happy to see me, admit it."

Carver hefts the sword up and runs towards the first fiery demon in his way to the rift. "Shut up," he calls over his shoulder. 

This has been the weirdest day so far and he hasn't even had lunch yet.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Poor Carver, nobody has heard of second breakfast in the Inquisition.


	4. Chapter 4

"You're a glorified clerk, a _bureaucrat_ ," the Seeker yells at the chantry representative. Nobody can put quite so much disdain into a word like Seeker Pentaghast. For the first time since he met her, Carver really starts to like her.

He follows the white sun symbol on the Seeker's shield up the hill. The snow looks green. It's the light of the Breach reflecting on it but it looks like the sky has been sick and puked all over the Frostback Mountains. The Seeker stomps the snow into the ground as if she wants to punish it.

This is supposed to be a charge to the next fight but it feels more like a doomed hike. Maybe he should have picked the way through the mountain instead of charging into battle. He isn't even sure what kind of battle this is going to be. If rifts open everywhere, with demons pouring through, what difference does it make if he joins the fight on the hill instead of one on the other side of the mountain?

Funny, after dragging him through rows of angry people throwing rotten fruits at him and the bureaucrat demanding to get him thrown into prison, the Seeker left it to _Carver_ to decide where they should go next. Because they have to keep him alive. As if he has any idea what to do.

His hand is burning up in sickly green fire whenever the hole in the sky convulses. People always says that you get used to pain after a while but that's not true. You just can't run away from your own body. You have to stick with it, no matter how much it hurts, no matter how much you hate it.

The Breach keeps spitting out green bombs of flames, exploding trees around them. Carver stares at the stump of what used to be a tree, now smoldering in black ash and green fire. It's only a matter of time until one of those bombs falls onto their heads.

"Spread out!" he yells to the others, running faster to take up the lead.

"Why?" the Seeker asks back with indignation. She probably didn't expect him to actually act like a leader when she forced him into this role.

 _'Because if you ask me to make decisions for you, you can't expect me to be quiet for the rest of the time',_ he thinks to himself.

"Because we have to minimize the risk that one of those flame bombs takes out all of us."  

"True." The Seeker takes a sharp turn and runs closer to the mountain side while Solas goes to the other side of the path.

Varric stays on the path but falls back a few paces. "I'm telling you," he calls out, "You don't want the dwarf stumbling through shrubbery, this is much faster."

Carver nods at him and runs forward. He can already hear the sound of battle and he forces himself to run faster. People die when soldiers come late.

The path narrows again, leading around the top of the hill and toward a stone gate. He has to slow down to catch his breath, watching, as a soldier runs towards him. Just then, another green fire bomb hits the stone gate, throwing the soldier forward. He lands in front of Carver's feet and doesn't move anymore.

Pulling the sword from his back, he runs, throwing himself into the fight. Demons rise from the ground in green flames and he cuts them down with all his strength. His cursed hand crackles and burns in flames but he ignores it, tightening his grip and swings his sword even faster.

The Seeker and the mage run past him and Solas stops for a moment, narrowly avoiding getting his head sliced off his neck when Carver swings against a demon.

"You have to seal the rift. More come through if you don't." Solas holds his gaze, the green fire throwing dark shadows on his face.

"I have to kill them, all of them!" Carver runs forward, slicing through wraiths and demons.

Solas is at his side again, grabbing his marked hand with surprising strength. "Only you can seal the rifts. I wish I could take this curse from you but I cannot. You are the only one."

"Fine." Carver turns to the crystalline structure and raises his hand. In his mind, he shoots the burning pain in his hand forward and crushes the crystal. His hand erupts in light, and if feels like a rope of energy shoots out, looping around the rift. It feeds on him, draining him of life. He lets the energy pull at him until it becomes almost unbearable and then yanks the rope back, as if he has to rein in a stubborn ox.

The rift closes with a burst of green light and the air around them stops humming. In the sudden silence, Solas comes up to Carver and smiles at him. "Sealed, as before. You are becoming quite proficient at this."

Carver draws in a breath and waits for the fatigue to go away. He stares at his hand, the green flame receding to a slim cut in his palm. "Yeah, Cullen always said I needed a hobby."

Varric strolls up to them, fastening his crossbow Bianca to his back. "Let's hope it works on the big one."

A very familiar voice makes Carver look up.

Former Templar Knight-Commander Cullen runs towards them. "Lady Cassandra, you managed to close the rift? Well done."

"Do not congratulate me, Commander," the Seeker says. "This was the prisoner's doing."

"The prisoner?" He looks up to Carver and his eyes widen when he recognizes him. "Carver?" He turns to the Seeker. "Carver is the prisoner?"

"He stepped out of a rift at the temple with the mark on his hand," the Seeker explains.

"And you took him prisoner?" Cullen points at Carver. "You know him! He was one of the best templars in the Gallows and the last to stay there with me. We travelled here together, how — "

"Enough!" Lady Cassandra stares at Cullen until he closes his mouth and takes a step back. "I'm aware that my judgement might have been impaired by my grief."

Cullen acknowledges the explanation with a nod and comes over to Carver and pulls him into a hug. "Andraste's grace, I'm so glad to see you."

He lets go of Carver and his eyes linger on the faint green glow in Carver's palm. "I thought you were dead."

Carver shrugs, hiding the relief to see his friend. "Not dead, just slightly damaged." He holds up his marked hand.

"Does it hurt?"

"You know, you're the first person to ask me that," Carver says. "Yes, it fucking hurts like fuck."

"I'm sorry."

The Seeker comes up to them, looking at her feet. "I want to apologize for my mistrust."

"Could have happened to anybody I'm sure." His hand flares up again as the Breach chews up the sky once more. He turns to Cullen. "We have to get to the rift, end this somehow."

"The path to the temple should be clear now."

Carver clenches his marked fist as if he could extinguish the flames but it just burns brighter and more painfully. "Arse of the Maker," he growls through clenched teeth, ignoring the dark look the Seeker gives him for his blasphemy.

"Leliana will try to meet you there, Lady Cassandra" Cullen says to the Seeker.

"Then we'd best move quickly," she says.

Cullen turns to Carver with a solemn look. "Maker watch over you — for all our sakes." He turns and grabs the arm of an injured soldier, helping him walk toward the stone gate.

Carver takes the lead again, daring the Seeker to say anything against it with a look but she turns away. He jumps down a pile of rubble onto a plateau of what looks like molten lava. As he looks around, an unnerving feeling of familiarity creeps up his neck.

"This is where you walked out of the fade and our soldiers found you," the Seeker says. "They say a woman was in the rift behind you. Nobody knows who she was."

Carver stares at the broken ruin of what used to be the Temple of Sacred Ashes. "I'm sorry Seeker, I don't remember anything."

"Please, call me Cassandra."

Carver looks around at the molten ground, corpses half buried in it, still burning. Their hands stretched forward, trying to protect themselves from annihilation sweeping over them, freezing them in their death pose. Corpses, shrunken to the bones, their faces locked in a permanent scream.

"I wish I knew what happened, Lady Cassandra. I wish...," he shakes his head. "I just hope the mark works on the Breach."

"We will soon know," Lady Cassandra says and walks up a pile of rubble that used to be stairs.

Carver stares at the corpses, wondering which one Siljan might have been. "I don't belong here," he says quietly to himself, "I should be dead."

"But you're not, Junior," Varric says behind him. "And frankly I'm not sure if I would have survived the wrath of your sister if you were, so I thank the Maker for that."

Carver holds out his marked hand, the green flames angrily dancing on it. "What if it doesn't work? What if this fucking hand can't do shit?"

"Then we have at least tried," Varric says, beckoning him to come with him. "Makes us into fabulous heroes. Someone should write a book about us."

Carver climbs up after him. "And who would be the writer?"

"Who else but me could do it justice?" Varric says with a grin over his shoulder.

Carver chuckles. "Then I better make sure to not destroy your career."

"I'd be grateful... oh damn." Varric stops and stares up to the Breach. From this up close it's gigantic and it seems to be miles above them. "That's a long way up."

Carver stares up to the maw of the Breach, watching the arcs of light sweeping down to the crystal floating several paces above the ground. It's bigger than anything he has ever seen. The mark on his hand flares up in bright, biting flames as the crystal changes shapes.

"I hope someone has an idea how I can reach that thing."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Suddenly it all got sad. Lucky for us, Varric knows how to deflect that.
> 
> I will soon speed up and move forward but I just love the beginning of the game/story, it's so profound.


	5. Chapter 5

* * *

 

* * *

 

Despite the lyrium cracking in green glowing lines through the cliffs all around and the giant crystal in the sky, what disturbs him the most is the sound. The air in the whole valley vibrates with a drone of hollow despair.

The sound fills his head like a fog, making it difficult to think. Seeker Cassandra is saying something but he can't understand, her voice muffled by the drone in his head. She doesn't catch him staring at her in incomprehension because she turns back to greet a group of soldiers coming up the broken stairs. Carver shakes his head, trying to get rid of the fog in his head.

"Leliana!" Seeker Cassandra calls out and greets the woman leading the soldiers. Carver recognizes her, she held him prisoner with Cassandra. She exudes the same kind of ruthless determination that he sees in Cassandra's eyes and he doesn't trust her either to care for his personal well being at all.

"Junior?" Varric comes up to his side and his voice slowly works its way through Carver's head. If he concentrates, he can ignore the drone.

"It's huge."

"Yes," Solas says, appearing on his other side. "This was the first rift, and it's the key."

"To closing the Breach?" Carver asks.

"I believe so, yes."

His hand prickles with energy, the hair on his arms standing up.

"This is your chance to end this," Cassandra says, "are you ready?"

Carver stares at the giant crystal, deforming with loud cracks. He can feel every crack, every deformation like a spike into his hand. "Not gonna get any more ready than this," he says, flexing his hand.

"We have to get closer to it," Cassandra says and then turns to the soldiers and Leliana. "I want archers all around and the rest of your soldiers at our backs." She turns back to Carver and indicates to him to lead the way.

He follows a path around the open courtyard but it looks like he's running through a foreign world. Something has turned the mountains around them black, and green veins glow through cracks. The blackness swallows the minimal light from the grey sky, drenching everything in poisonous green. Carver feels the hum of lyrium in his bones, reacting to something all around him. It's not the same sensation as being close to someone doing magic but similar.

As he comes to the end of the path, a red glow catches his attention. Varric comes up to his side and snorts angrily.

"Red lyrium. Saw enough of that shit in the Deep Roads."

Carver doesn't have to ask what he means, he knows when and with whom he had been in the Deep Roads. And he vividly remembers the red glow of the idol that had driven Knight Commander Stannard to madness.

"Just don't touch it," Varric growls.

"Wouldn't dream of it."

The drone gets louder and a voice, booming and dark, says, "Prepare for the ritual."

Carver stops dead in his tracks and Cassandra runs into him.

"What is that voice? Who is speaking?" she asks.

Pain stabs through Carver's head as something tells him that he has heard this voice before.

"Someone help me!" a woman screams from somewhere inside the deformed crystal. "What's going on here," another voice, his own voice says and Carver's hand flares up.

Cassandra grabs his arm. "That was you. Most Holy called out to you! But..."

Before she can continue asking him what he can't explain, a blinding light explodes from the crystal and a giant being formed of smoke and flames swings an axe made of clouds towards them. As they jump back, a ghostly image of the Divine, her arms bound with flames, is visible and then Carver sees an image of himself run towards her.

"What's going on here?" the image asks and the tortured face of the Divine turns to him and cries, "Run while you still can. Warn them!"

"We have an intruder," the booming voice says and the flaming eyes turn to the ghostly representation of Carver. "Slay the human!" it bellows before the white light disappears.

"What vision was that?" Cassandra calls out, confronting Carver with a murderous stare. "Was it real what we saw? You were there?"

Carver turns away, hissing from the pain in his glowing hand. "I don't remember. But..."

"What?"

"It felt familiar."

"The Fade bleeds into this place," Solas says calmly. "We saw echos of what happened here."

"And the Divine?" Cassandra asks, her voice filled with grief. "She spoke to you, is she...?"

"I'm sorry," Carver says, "I don't know."

"The rift is is closed but not sealed," Solas continues. "It will only hold temporarily. I believe the mark can reopen it and then seal it properly and safely."

The green glow on Carver's hand is jumping like a fanned flame, spitting sparks to the ground. "Alright, I'm gonna try to open it."

"That will surely attract attention from the other side," Solas says, still infuriatingly calm.

"That means demons," Cassandra acknowledges. She turns to the soldiers in the back. "Stand ready!"

Carver lifts his green glowing hand. The pain has become a constant background noise to the humming of lyrium in his veins. Which reminds him of something.

"Solas, you're the only mage we have here right now, right?"

"I believe so, yes."

"And all this," Carver gestures to the green glowing madness around him, "has something to do with magic, don't you think?"

Solas hesitates, his face showing no emotions. "I would say it is very old magic, of a kind we have little knowledge about."

"Well, I'm a templar and I have abilities that work against magic," Carver says. "But when I use them, they will affect you too."

"I can protect myself."

"Have you ever swallowed a Cleansing Wave?" Carver says and can't help but grin. "I've been told that it's pretty nasty. It purges all your magical effects and blocks you from the Fade. You won't be using your magic again for some time."

He can't help but feel a smug satisfaction at the horrified look on Solas' face, having shaken the mage for once.

"I appreciate the warning," Solas says. "Am I protected if I stay behind you?"

"Give it a few paces and you should be fine."

The mage disappears from his field of view and Carver takes a long look around at the archers on the ruins, hiding behind cover. The soldiers behind him look at him with their swords in their hands and he can see the fear in their eyes through the slots in their helmets. Memories flash through his head, screams of a battle lost in Ostagar, of eyes that couldn't hold fear anymore.

Cassandra comes up to him, a small, familiar looking vial in her hand. "If you intend to use your abilities, you should take this dose of lyrium. You haven't had any while you were imprisoned."

He takes the small vial with a grateful nod and swallows the contents in one go. It ices its way down his throat, the feeling familiar. For a blink of an eye the world goes silent and then the familiar rush slams through his body like an ice-cold wind. He sways, the rush even more intense after having been in withdrawal for the last few days. Someone holds him with a hand on his back; it's Cassandra and he gives her a grateful smile.

Then, just as the rush is receding, the world slams into focus again and he doubles over from the onslaught of impressions. All that lyrium, previously just a strange lighting effect in the granite, now sings a grinding song in his body. He can even hear the red lyrium, the pitch all wrong, shrieking its own song. The drone in the air drills into his skull and the magic of the rift above presses on him like a giant fist. It's almost an instinctual reaction to gather his powers at his core and focus them to shield himself against the attacking magic. He looks over to Cassandra, his vision swimming and his templar power humming under his fingernails.

Cassandra gives him a nod and readies her sword and shield. He stretches his arm, focussing the burning energy of the marked hand onto the crystal, willing it to open for him. His other hand twitches, freezing under the load of the Cleansing Wave he holds at the ready. The rift twists and cracks under the lighting bolt shooting from his hand and the drone gets louder and louder until the crystal explodes in a deafening blast and spits out a gigantic creature that seems to form out of the light itself.

It towers over them, long ram-horns winding backwards from its head and it takes Carver a second to recognize it as a pride demon, albeit in a gigantic form. Carver snarls, anger fueling the power he has readied. The demon roars, the crystal forms again and Carver releases the Cleansing Wave with a punch. The wave shoots forward, negating the magic in front of him and for a moment the air smells crisp and clear. But then the crystal expands again with a crack, unaffected by the wave.

At least the demon seems to stagger from it, if only making it vulnerable for a moment. Cassandra yells her command and the archers let their arrows fly. Carver readies another ability, his vision shimmering in lyrium blue. Again he gathers his power in his center. He has always been good at this, one of the best in the Gallows.

Taking the sword from his back, he uses it to focus _Wrath of Heaven_ onto the demon and shoots it at him with everything he has. He puts so much force into it, it almost knocks him off his own feet. His marked hand burns and hisses and the blue glow begins to fade from his vision, exhaustion threatening to take over but he forces himself to run towards the beam of light that he has thrown onto the demon.

The monster hisses, its barrier fading and a blast of ice hits and freezes its legs. Solas has apparently managed to shield himself from the _Cleansing Wave_ and his attack makes the monster vulnerable. Carver hits its legs, thick like trees, with his sword, shattering the ice. But it laughs at him, shaking the injury off and the cuts he made seal as he watches.

"The rift! You have to disrupt it, it will affect the demons!" Solas yells at him, freezing a group of smaller demons in his way.

Carver wants to argue but even through the haze of anger and exhaustion he can see that their efforts in injuring the giant pride demon are futile. If they can't find a way to seriously harm it, it will just keep healing itself until they're all dead.

He turns, feeling sick to his stomach for turning his back to the fight and runs closer to the rift. A few demons shoot out of the ground in front of him but he slices them down as fast as he can. When he is under the expanding crystal of the rift, he holds his hand up again and wills the lightning bolt to expand from it. Its golden light is a balm in all the poisonous green and red and the receding blue haze in his vision.

The crystal cracks under the golden rope of light, twitching like a living thing, trying to evade the light. The droning noise shifts in pitch, grating on his ears and then the crystal turns into green fog.

Carver tries to pull at the fog with his hand but the mark doesn't react. The lesser demons have disappeared, somehow replaced by columns of green light that feel cold on his skin when passes them. He runs back to his companions, to the actual fight. The giant demon is on his knees, half frozen by Solas' ice.

He plunges his sword into its back, and a painful roar from the beast is his reward.

"The rift is not closed yet," Solas yells at him, shooting another blanket of ice at the creature. He is still powerful but Carver sees the first signs of exhaustion in his face. Even a powerful mage, and Solas is impressively powerful, has a limit.

"I know, but the mark doesn't react when it's like this." He gestures at the green fog, floating like a sheet of gossamer silk in the air. It's almost beautiful.

The creature rises again, sluggish but just as deadly as before. One sweep of its arms throws a whole row of swordfighters against the remaining walls of the ruin and Cassandra only manages to dodge at the last moment.

"We can't do this much longer," Solas says. His fingers draw a complicated pattern in the air, light jumping between his fingertips. "Come with me, I will try to aggravate the rift, then you can close it."

"Aggravating a rift to the Fade sounds like a really bad idea," Carver mumbles to himself. He hates having to leave the combined attack on the demon again, having to leave Cassandra, Varric and the remaining soldiers to fight for their lives so that he can hold up his cursed hand.

Solas lifts his hands, still drawing patterns in the air, light of a softer shade of green gathering around his hands and then he throws the ball of light at the green fog. It shrieks like an angry demon and instantly turns back into a crystal. In the same moment, Carver's hand lights up and burns like real fire.

He screams, throwing the energy in his arm against the crystal, watching the golden rope of light connecting to the crystal. It shrinks, twitching, screaming and he pulls harder at the rope of light. He can feel it draining him. It feeds on him.

Something hits his back and he loses his focus. The lighting rope falters and splinters. A demon has appeared behind him, clawing at him, ripping straight through his armor, its mouth snapping close a mere finger width away from his head.

A bolt hits the creature, slowing it down and Carver grips his sword with both hands, clenching his teeth against the pain and slices the demon in half from top to bottom. Something warm trickles down his back but he ignores it.

"Sorry, Junior," Varric calls out from the top of a boulder, "didn't see that." He shoots demons as fast as he can load his bolts, keeping them away from their backs.

"Carver!" Solas throws his strange green energy at the rift again. Carver turns back, focussing on the rift again. The golden rope shoots from his hand, feeding on his energy, his very life force. He holds the connection, pulling at it with his mind until, finally, the golden light overpowers the rift, snapping it closed.

The rift seals up, swallowing itself, until it's just a small green line in the sky. The golden rope of light dissolves and nothing holds Carver on his legs anymore.

He doesn't feel it when his head hits the ground.

* * *

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Phew, I hope that came over as stressful as it felt.


	6. Chapter 6

* * *

 

* * *

 

Sunlight tickles his nose. It smells of fresh hay, melting snow and log fires burning. Mother is probably cooking porridge over the fire in the kitchen. He turns on his side, stealing a few more moments of rest before he has to get up. Bethany will come and steal away his blanket soon, she always knows when he is about to wake up. She will be here any moment.

Carver's eyes fly open. Bethany will not come, neither will Marian, and mother... is not cooking porridge.

The bed is too soft and he's wearing something that feels suspiciously like orlesian silk. It has golden buttons down the front, way too many to be practical and they shine so bright in the sunlight that it hurts to looks at them. He sits up, taking in the unfamiliar room. The walls are made of logs, sealed with clay, and there's glass in the window.

"You're up! I didn't mean to wake you!" A slim elf, carrying towels and clothing in their arms, stares at him with wide eyes.

"Where am I?"

The elf falls to their knees, pressing their forehead onto the carpet. "I beg your forgiveness and your blessing, Herald, I am but a humble servant."

"Will you stop that," Carver says, setting his feet on the carpet. It's probably Orlesian too, it's almost indecently soft. "Where am I? And get up."

"You're back in Haven, my Lord. They say you've saved us. The Breach stopped growing, just like the mark on your hand."

Carver stares at his hand. The mark has shrunk to a cut in his palm and when he focuses on it, it glows green but it's nothing like the angry green fire it used to have.

"It's all anybody has talked about for the last three days."

"Three days?"

"You were not well. Lady Seeker said to tell her at once when you woke up." The elf gets up and stumbles backwards to the door.

"Wait!" Carver calls after them. "I need something to wear."

"At once she said, at once," the elf says as they run away.

A cold draft comes through the open door. Carver gets up and closes it. He looks around the room. A desk stands opposite the bed, close to the window. Books and papers are strewn all over it, as if someone has been working there a little while ago. On the table next to the bed is a little figurine of Andraste, like Cullen used to have, with a burning candle in front of it.

He looks out of the window. The sky is winterly grey but it's not the depressing greenish grey he last saw when the Breach tried to eat the world. He searches the sky, blinking against the sunlight peeking through the clouds. The Breach is still there, looking like a green eddy of clouds but its maw seems to be calm.

He looks back at his hand, at the green light in his palm. "At least this was good for something then."

Looking around, he spots a closet leaning against the wall. His fingers are absentmindedly playing with the gleaming buttons on the silken shirt and he sends a quick prayer up to whoever listens that the closet contains something else for him to wear.

It turns out, the closet contains indeed three sets of armor but apparently the same person responsible for the ridiculously gleaming buttons on his current dress, was also responsible for the armor design. A beam of sunlight falls on the armor and Carver has to close his eyes against the light reflecting off all the gilding. He picks out one set that looks at least like it's his size and has enough freedom of movement for his arms. Of course, the shoulderguards, designed like overlapping feathers, are gilded and glitter with every move.

 _I bet I look like a bird_. Marian would give him so much shit if she saw him like this. And Merrill — there is a bite in his chest when he thinks about her — Merrill would probably love it. Tell him how pretty he looked with all that gold.

He shoves the thoughts away, opens the door to the outside and immediately closes it again. There's people out there, at least a hundred, forming an alley for him to walk through, as if he is some kind of king. Either they want to have better aim for their rotten fruits to throw at him or they like him now and want to cheer him on. Neither prospect is very appealing to him.

He takes another look at the glittering golden "feathers" on his armor and shrugs. Maybe they just want to laugh at his ridiculous outfit. With a deep breath, he steps outside, taking in the snow covered roofs of the simple huts and houses of the village, and the huge chantry building, overlooking the village. That's probably where he should go.

A wave of straightening backs runs through the alley of people as he approaches, people staring at him as if he's some kind of king. He hears whispers of "That's him, that's the Herald of Andraste," and looks behind himself to check who they could mean by that.

"He stopped the Breach from growing, he saved us," someone says in the crowd and the expression _Herald of Andraste_ keeps jumping at him from the crowd, whispered, called out, even sung in one case. He hurries his steps, forcing his feet to keep on walking towards the chantry, instead of running the other way.

A cluster of chantry sisters and brothers in their familiar garb gathers around the heavy doors of the massive building, shivering in the cold. He pushes the doors open and looks at the shivering men and women.

"Why don't you come inside?" he aks, holding the door open.

"Chancellor Roderick said that he wants nothing to do with us."

"That's ridiculous, you're clergy and this is the chantry, where else should you be?"

"He thinks..." one brother begins but is interrupted by a sister.

"That's the Herald of Andraste, I will follow his word, not that of Chancellor Roderick." She goes inside with sure steps and one by one, the rest follow her.

Carver sighs. A headache begins to form behind his eyes. "I'm not the Herald of anybody, why do you call me that?"

The chantry sister turns to him and bows her head. "You saved us. Andraste herself gave you this mark to save us in this time of need. You are her Herald."

"Andraste gave me...?" He stares at the group of high ranking chantry clergy, all bowing for him and his green glowing hand. He lets the door slip from his hand, waiting for it to clunk shut. A couple of candles blow out from the wind and in the dim darkness, he slips away from the group.

He wonders for a moment where he should look for Lady Cassandra but then he hears enraged yelling behind a door and is fairly certain that he has reached his destination.

Upon opening the door, he sees Cassandra engaged in a heated discussion with the 'bureaucrat' and Lady Leliana watching. The chancellor turns around upon his entering and demands him to be chained and prepared for transport to his trial. Cassandra tells the guards to ignore the order and leave them, and they turn and go. Carver takes careful note of who seems to be in charge here and it's not that chancellor.

Cassandra lowers her voice. "The Breach is stable for now but it is still a threat. I will not ignore it."

"Let me guess, you need my hand for this," Carver says, stepping forward.

"Oh, you have done plenty enough, your actions will be taken into account by the next Divine," the chancellor spits at him.

Carver stares him down. "I don't think we're done here yet."

"The Breach is not the only threat we face," Cassandra says.

Lady Leliana steps up to Cassandra and the way she walks, reminds Carver of a cat. Her face is half hidden in the shadow of a scarf and her voice has an edge to it. "Someone was behind the explosion at the Conclave. Someone who Most Holy did not expect." She looks directly at the chancellor. "Perhaps they died with the others — or may have had allies who yet still live."

"I am a suspect now?" the chancellor calls out, enragement turning his face red.

"You, and many others."

"But not the prisoner?"

Carver leans back against the wall and rolls his eyes. "I don't think I'm still a prisoner, am I?"

Cassandra looks at him. "I heard the Divine, she called to him for help."

"And the mark, a coincidence —"

"The Maker sent him to us in our darkest hour," Cassandra says. "That's what I believe and I may be wrong, but I will not ignore that he is our only hope for closing the Breach."

"Can we cut this short?" Carver interrupts. His head is really starting to hurt now and he's getting hungry. "The mark on my hand can solve a bunch of problems and I'm sure we can find out what happened along the way. So, from now on, who am I working for?"

The chancellor turns on Cassandra. "This is not for you to decide, the chantry will not— "

Cassandra pulls a thick book from a shelf and lets it drop on the table with a thump. "You know what this is, chancellor," she says, staring at him. "A writ from the Divine, granting us the authority to act. As of now, I declare the Inquisition to be reborn." She steps up to the chancellor, who stumbles to get away from her. "We will close the Breach, we will find those responsible and we will restore order. With or without your approval."

Carver flinches at this declaration. He has heard the 'restore order' speech before, in Kirkwall, and it didn't exactly end well.

The chancellor mutters something about consequences and leaves the room with a huff.

"This is the Divine's directive," Leliana says. "Rebuild the Inquisition of old. Find those who will stand against the chaos."

Carver pushes himself off the wall and looks at the symbol on the book. It looks like the sun of the Seekers. Or like the symbol that is burned in the forehead of mages made tranquil. It brings a chill to his spine. "What's this Inquisition of old?"

"It predated the chantry," Leliana says. "People who banded together to restore order in a world gone mad."

"Restore order?" Carver asks. "Whose order exactly?"

"When they laid down their banner afterwards, they became the Templar Order."

"So, the chantry kind of order?" Carver looks from one woman to the other. "See, this may be weird coming from a templar but I don't like this. I don't like it when one organization acts like they're king and queen of the lands and can define what order means. I've seen one Knight Commander gone mad with that idea, I'd rather not repeat that."

"Knight-Commander Meredith was corrupted — "

"The whole templar order is corrupted! Do you think Kirkwall was the only Circle where mages were made tranquil just because a templar felt like it?" The red-hot staff with the sun symbol at the end, doused in templar flame, pressed to the forehead of someone who in that instant stopped being a person, their eyes turning dull, their bodies going slack. He has watched that sun burn many foreheads, dread freezing him in place. But if he wanted to keep protecting Bethany and even Marian, he had to stay silent. A person being turned into a mindless tool, their emotions, their very soul stolen. Every instance he has watched has followed him into his nightmares.

"Kirkwall was just one symptom of a whole disease. Templars have gotten used to abusing their power without consequences. This war has been going on for years, and it will keep on going because the whole system is at fault." He turns to Cassandra, looking her in the eyes. "I'm not going to be your tool to restore something that you consider to be the right kind of order. I'll close the Breach and that's it. I'm not going to help you rebuild a new templar order to terrorize the people of Thedas."

Cassandra is quiet for a long time. Finally she nods. "I understand. I think..." She sighs and mumbles a small prayer. "I promise to rethink my stance with your words in mind. But for now, we need people helping us, we have no army, no supplies, no templars, no mages. And the chantry doesn't support us either. We need to unite the people who are willing to do what must be done to save the world under a single banner. To work together, with you."

"I can hardly say no, can I?" Carver says with a sigh. "Fine, I'll lead this inquisition, gather people to support us, fix the Breach."

"That's all we ask," Leliana says and Carver has a distinct feeling that she could say much more but decided against it.

Cassandra holds out her hand. "Fix this with us, before it's too late."

Carver takes her hand and shakes it. "Now, that this is done, can I get something to eat?"

A rare smile appears on Lady Cassandra's face. "Yes, we have a kitchen, I'm sure the cook can whip something up for you. And if not, there's an inn in the village. One of the guards will show you."

"Do we still have guards? Chantry guards?" Carver looks from her to Leliana and back. "I mean, didn't our chantry support walk out of here with the Chancellor just now?"

"Oh." Cassandra looks flustered for once and when she opens the door, only one guard is still standing next to it, his helmet in his hands.

"Uhm, Jesling went with the chancellor," the guard says, turning the helmet in his hands. "He said, the chancellor did, that you're not chantry any more, I'm sorry Lady Cassandra, and that we're not working for you and that you're heretics for protecting that imposter." He looks over to Carver and quickly drops his gaze.

"But you didn't leave," Leliana says softly.

"Don't care what the chancellor says, that's the Herald of Andraste. I'm staying. This is important."

Cassandra puts her hand on his and stills his nervous playing with his helmet. "What is your name?"

"Morten, Lady Cassandra, been with the templars here in Haven for six years now."

"The Inquisition will employ you," Cassandra says, "you will have food and shelter and we will pay you wages eventually, just..." she looks helplessly to Leliana.

"Just not right away," Leliana says, "we are securing funds and resources now."

"That's fine, Serah, I don't need much." Guard Morten puts his helmet back on. "I know a few templars who want to follow the Herald of Andraste, I will tell them of this new Inquisition."

"Have them find me," Cassandra says. "We need people."

The guard leaves with a bow towards Carver. Cassandra turns to him. "Let me show you to the kitchen, I feel a bit famished myself."

Leliana falls into step along with them into a long hallway out to the side of the chantry building. "I received note that Lady Josephine Montilyet has arrived, should I ask her to join us? I have some Antivan coffee left that she'll surely enjoy."

Cassandra nods. "Yes, why not. And if you could find Cullen as well? We might as well have a first strategy meeting over coffee and biscuits."

Leliana gives a nod and disappears into another hallway. This part of the building is like a labyrinth, winding tunnels carved into the stone of the mountain that the chantry leans against. Carver tries to remember the way but he isn't sure if he will ever find a way out of here on his own. Finally, they end up in the kitchen, warm and aglow in gold by a fire in the stove, with a big table in the middle. The smell of stew makes his mouth water.

A woman and a man, both equally wide shouldered, turn around as they enter. The man smiles at Lady Cassandra and the woman scowls and gets a few bowls from a shelf.

"About time, my lady," she says with the same sharp Nevarran accent that Cassandra has.

"Very kind, but we only wanted some coffee and biscuits — "

"Lady Cassandra Allegra Pentaghast, you haven't eaten all day and I made stew, fit to serve a king, for you and the Herald of Andraste and you will eat it now." She sets bowls on the table and looks at Cassandra until she sits down.

Carver doesn't need an invitation, his stomach is growling loudly and he spoons the thick stew into his mouth before his butt has even settled on the chair. By the time his brain registers how good the stew is, he has already emptied half of the bowl. He finishes it off and holds out the bowl with a hopeful smile. "Can I get some more?"

The man and the woman smile widely and she fills his bowl again. "I'm glad my stew is appreciated by the Herald of Andraste."

Carver waits until the man and the woman have turned around again, kneading and forming loaves of bread. He turns to Cassandra, "You have to stop this 'Herald of Andraste' thing, I'm no herald."

"It's a rumor," Leliana says at his back. He has not heard her come in. "One we do nothing to dispel for now."

"Why not?"

Leliana takes a seat at the table and accepts the bowl of stew with a grateful nod. Before she can answer, a woman in golden ruffles and rustling skirts, floats into the kitchen, looking entirely out of place but seemingly unperturbed by it. She takes a seat next to Carver and gives him a dazzling smile.

"May I introduce, Lady Josephine Montilyet from Antiva."

Carver nods at her.

"I originally invited Lady Montilyet to present the idea of the inquisition to the Divine with me, after the Conclave," Cassandra says, a shadow passing over her face.  "But now we need her diplomatic connections even more to gather support among the powerful and noble families of Thedas."

Cullen enters the kitchen, greeting everyone with a nod and takes a seat. He takes a bowl of stew with a grateful smile. Carver picks a slice of fresh bread and bites into it. It's still warm and he has to stop himself from moaning, it's so good. "What do we need the nobility for?" he asks after swallowing the bite.

"Sponsoring," Lady Josephine says, breaking small bits from her slice of bread and eating them like pralines. "For now we stand alone and will run out of funding soon. You being seen as the Herald of Andraste will help us to secure funding."

"How convenient." Carver picks another slice of softly steaming bread and looks at it. "Where did this all come from then? The flour, the vegetables?"

"Chantry stocks," the cook says.

"Well, we can just take that, can we not?" He looks at Cassandra.

"Steal from the chantry?" The Seeker has never looked so horrified.

Carver shrugs. "You're the one who keeps insisting on calling me the Herald of Andraste." He notices how everyone looks at him and it occurs to him that no one else in this room will make this decision. It's on him. "We confiscate everything in this chantry in the name of the Herald of Andraste."

"But..." Cassandra begins to protest but stops. "Yes, it will be done. We are the Inquisition. The Herald of Andraste is on our side."

"Maker's arse, I hate that title," Carver mumbles.

Cullen chokes on his stew as he tries to hide his laughter.

Carver holds up his bowl. "Can I get more stew?"

The cook grins. "Anything for the Herald of Andraste."


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter may be rambling but there's important stuff happening so you just have to come along.
> 
> We got art for this chapter!
> 
> Th3_Morrigan drew this picture in exchange for a story I wrote with her OC. That story is published here: [Under a Blood Red Sky](https://archiveofourown.org/works/16576919).
> 
> Now look at our baby bird:

* * *

 

Inquisitor Carver Hawke by [th3morrigan](http://th3morrigan.tumblr.com) at [blasteddoodles](https://blasteddoodles.tumblr.com/post/178958581583/inquisitor-carver-my-half-of-an-art-trade-with)

* * *

 

"On foot?" Carver stares at Cassandra in disbelief. He pulls out the map again and holds it against the Requisition's officer's table, so that the wind can't blow it away. At least it isn't raining but the cold wind makes sure to remind them of the snow up here in the mountains. "That's at least a three days march. If the weather holds." He hasn't exactly looked forward to a another horseride but at least they could have found that chantry mother in half the time.

"Chancellor Roderick and his templars took the horses. We're going to have get our own horses." Cassandra says with a longing smile. Carver wonders if she's missing the horse she rode on when they travelled to the temple. She had been quite affectionate with it.

"Someone has to know where you can get good horses around here," he says, looking at Leliana. He isn't quite sure what exactly a spymaster does but getting information should be right up her alley.

"I will see to it, Herald," she answers with a slight edge to the way she says his title.

Carver has decided to ignore Leliana's subtle ways of criticism until she actually says what bothers her about him. For now, he's just going to continue to do what needs to be done. He loads a pack with tents and supplies on one of the lighter footed mules, at least they still have those. A squad of former templars, now with the new inquisition symbol on their armor, will follow them with slow pack mules, to bring supplies to the camp in the Outskirts.

The sun has come up over the mountain, making the inquisition symbols glow golden. The new symbol, the sun with a sword through it, is now on every flag and banner. A strange smell wafts through the air, as another flag unfolds above the chantry doors.

"Ah, the smell of Blood Lotus and Deep Mushrooms," Varric drawls as he carries his pack over to the mule. On Carver's questionable look he continues. "Moth repellent. Cassandra got all this stuff out of storage somewhere and it was on the same ship that brought me here. It must be from the first Inquisition. Gave me a headache, I'm telling you, the whole barge stank of this."

"She really came prepared," Carver says quietly and Varric nods.

"Makes you wonder how far ahead she has planned all this, doesn't it?"

Carver nods and straps his new sword to his hip and fixes a shield to the hand with the mark. He has exchanged the comically large zweihänder sword with a lighter blade that he can use one handed and the armorer has attached a special belt to the shield so that it stays on his arm when he has to use the mark. It's a nice, round shield, iron bands riveted to its front in a criss-cross pattern and of course the sun and sword symbol shining white in the middle.

"Let's go." He pulls his coat closed and marches down towards the city gate. Varric and Solas follow him closely, while Cassandra and Cullen follow a bit behind them, engaged in deep conversation.

"Hey, Junior," Varric says next to him, "still holding up alright?"

"It's been a bit much on the bullshit plate lately," Carver says, keeping his voice low.

"You went from being Thedas' most wanted criminal to joining the army of the faithful. Most people would have spread that out over more than one day." Varric chuckles but his worry looks genuine.

"Army of the faithful... don't remind me." Carver sighs. "None of this shit should have happened."

"Definitely agree with that."

Carver looks at Varric. "Tell me, why did _you_ stay? Cassandra said you're free to go."

"I like to think I’m as selfish and irresponsible as the next guy, but this…" Varric shakes his head. "Thousands of people died on that mountain. I was almost one of them. And now there’s a hole in the sky. Even I can’t walk away and just leave that to sort itself out."

"Yeah, I get it, same here to be honest. I'm not all that keen on the Herald thing but it is what it is for now."

"I heard it was useful in confiscating everything from the chantry." Varric grins at that. "A bold move, I'd say."

"Hey, I've been running the requisitions office at the Gallows for over a year before... the whole shit exploded. I know we'll need all that."

"You were in charge of requisition?"

"Supplies, provisions, I know how much a cart full of templars eat. Without the stock in the chantry, the inquisition would have starved in a day."

Varric chuckles again. "No wonder Cullen trusts you to handle this all, you've been his second in command for years."

"I was not, I... huh," now that he thinks about it, he's been at Cullen's side for pretty much anything, except when the Knight-Commander was called into Meredith's office. Not that he'd been sad to miss out on that. "Well, it had to be done."

"That seems to be your life motto."

Carver grins at that. "Better than the old one."

"Which is that?"

"Standing in the shadow."

Varric laughs out and then looks over his shoulder, making sure that Cassandra is out of earshot. "Speaking of shadow — I have news."

Carver moves closer to Varric and lowers his voice. "What is it?"

"Got a raven from the Shadow, they're in Orlais."

"In Orlais?" Carver tries to imagine his sister in the finery of orlesian fashion and fails. Bethany maybe, but Marian?

"Not in Val Royeaux, on this side of the Waking Sea, somewhere near the Imperial Highway. They might travel through the Dales now."

"Is Merrill still with them?"

Varric looks up to him with a reassuring smile and nods. "Isabela is sailing the Waking Sea, but Merrill and your sisters are travelling together."

"Do you think..." Carver looks over his shoulder to make sure that Cassandra is still engaged in her conversation with Cullen. He lowers his voice even more, leaning down to Varric so that he can hear. "Do you think we could find them?"

"Do we want that?" Varric hurries his steps to gain more distance to potential listeners. "What if Anders is still with them? Or other rebel mages, I can just see the Shadow army of rebel mages stomping through Haven's gate. Personally, I would love to have your sisters around and Daisy as well but... will Cassandra arrest them all or recruit them? You're the Herald but — "

"You think she'll want to replace me?"

"With Mar— I mean — with the Shadow? Maker, what a terrible idea that would be."

"Worse than me?"

Varric stops him from stomping ahead with a hand on his arm. "Listen, Junior, you're doing great. You got this whole organisation rolling in a _day,_ I've seen merchants failing to stock their stores in that time. I don't know if Andraste had her hand in this but if she did, she found the right guy for the job."

Cullen comes up to them. "Yes, I agree."

They pick up the pace again, Cassandra is now engaged in a conversation with Solas. Carver sighs. "I'm not andrastian enough for all this."

"Maybe it's enough that Andraste believes in you," Cullen says.

"The chantry sure doesn't," Carver says. "Our ambassador told me that the chantry keeps telling everyone that we can't stop the Breach and that me messing with it will make it worse." He flexes his hand with the mark, watching the rift light glow in his palm.

"Hopefully this Mother Giselle can convince them otherwise."

The path narrows between jagged rocks. Varric falls back a bit and Cullen takes the lead. Carver follows him, his arms stretched to the side in case he loses his footing. "Cullen," he asks quietly, "do we know how many people died at the Conclave?"

Cullen looks over his shoulder but doesn't meet his eyes. "We're still counting. Three-hundred at least. Every day we find someone else in the rubble. And some of the injured still suffer; there's not much hope that they'll survive." He shakes his head. "Adan is doing what he can with potions but he's no healer."

Carver wonders if he should mention that a very famous mage healer could be on the other side of the Frostback mountain range right this moment. _Better not._ "No village healer? Traveling healers?"

"If they were any, they were near the temple when it exploded. There's supposed to be a wise midwife, a herbal healer somewhere near Haven but nobody would tell me where."

"Of course," Carver murmurs, thinking about the midwife near Lothering he had helped sometimes.

"Why 'of course'?" Cullen jumps down a ledge and finally, the valley opens up and they can walk side by side again.

"You're a templar and she's probably a hedge mage, not quite strong enough to raise alarm as an apostate but probably not someone you want a templar to find out about."

"Former templar."

"Subtleties. 'Former' doesn't mean much for people in the country. Have someone from around here ask the old people in Haven, I bet they know someone."

Cullen nods and for a while they walk in silence. The land is getting greener the further they get away from the Frostback mountains. The green hills and hardy trees remind Carver painfully of Lothering, the home he lost to the Blight. He almost expects their little house to appear behind the next hill.

They stop for a break on top of a hill overlooking the country. Carver's boots are new and not quite his size and his feet are actively complaining about that. He puts some elfroot salve on his heel, where a red spot promises soon to grow blister. He cleans his hands in the dewy grass as Cullen sits down next to him with some bread and cheese.

"Best cheese in the chantry," he says as he hands Carver a piece.

"How lucky we are." Carver eats fast as it is his habit but stops to look at Cullen. "You should go back to Haven now, you know? Before it gets dark."

"There's plenty of time."

"Maybe, but you should — "

"Yes, I know!" Cullen shouts.

Carver is taken aback by his sudden outburst. He watches Cullen, waiting for him to explain himself. But the man seems to be determined to stare angrily ahead and never talk again.

"Andraste's arse Cullen, what was that about?" he finally asks.

"Nothing."

"Nugshit."

"Doesn't matter."

"Sure, that's why you're sulking here like a baby recruit."

Cullen finally turns to him, anger carving a deep line between his eyes. "I have to protect you. At all cost. You're our only hope and my friend and if anything happens to you..."

"Stop it," Carver says, grabbing Cullen's shoulder to make him look at him. "I'm not alone, I can take care of myself and I need you in Haven. If the chantry decides to march on us, the people need protection."

"But you..."

"This whole thing could topple over any moment if Roderick gets his hand on some forces. You have to prepare everyone we have and guard the village. We stand no chance if we lose Haven."

Cullen nods with a sigh. "I know you're right. I just..."

"I know," Carver says. He knows all about failure and pressuring yourself. He knows and he swallows it down just like Cullen.

"Alright, I'm going back with Jen and Morten. Don't do anything risky." Cullen looks at him.

Carver shrugs. "When have I ever..."

"Don't get me started." Cullen shakes his head and pulls Carver into a short embrace. "You're important, whether you like it or not."

Carver returns the embrace, their armor scraping against each other as he claps on Cullen's back. As Cullen turns back to get his men, Carver calls to him. "You know, if anything happens to me, what you'll really have to worry about is my sisters finding out."

"Maker's grace," Cullen blurts out and he actually turns pale.

Carver chuckles to himself as he climbs down to the rest of his troup. Varric grins at him and he relates the story to him as they trot forward through the beautiful landscape.

The trip would have been terribly boring if it hadn't been for the bandits that keep making the very stupid decision to attack a group of travellers led by Cassandra Pentaghast. They are no trouble for them but Carver begins to worry about the refugees that are supposed to be on this path to the Crossroads. They hardly meet any.

By the time the sun goes down, they've covered about a third of the distance and picked up only four refugees. Carver feels like it should be much more. They set up camp at the mouth of a cave and start a fire before the evening chill can draw into their bones. Solas brings a bunch of rabbits, expertly skinned, even though nobody saw him disappear and hunt for them.

While the rabbit stew cooks, Carver sits down next to Cassandra. They clean their swords and sharpen them.

"Shouldn't there be more refugees on this path?" he asks as his hands work the familiar, repetitive movements.

"Maybe they all moved to the Crossroads? Or they might avoid us," Cassandra says.

Carver nods. "We could be just another troop of bandits or rogue templars to them." He looks at his shield next to him. "I see now why you had the new symbol painted on everything."

"Yes," Cassandra says with a rare smile. "I hope we can establish this symbol for the Inquisition and show what good we do."

"People should know that we're here and that we can help."

"Yes!" Cassandra smiles at him in relief. "I'm glad we agree on that."

Carver drips some oil on his sword and works it into the metal. If he keeps working, he can ignore the dull pain from the green glowing cut in the palm of his left hand. "Do we have more of these banners? Or something like staffs with the Inquisition's symbol?"

"What do you have in mind?"

"People out here don't hear much. They don't know what's going on in Val Royeaux, Kirkwall or Denerim. They have their farms and meet at the market once a month and unless a minstrel comes to the market to tell of the most recent news, nothing really reaches them."

Cassandra puts her sword in her lap and looks at him. "You come from a place like this."

"Around Lothering, for the most part. My father..."

"Malcolm Hawke," Cassandra interrupts, "I know. An apostate, in the graces of the Wardens."

"That didn't help us much in our lives, we had to move around a lot." Carver sighs. So many times had they started to build something, only to leave it all behind when the templars began patrolling around their house. "For the people to learn that we're here, that the Inquisition is helping, they need to see us. We have to claim these lands, be visible."

"We could set up flagpoles with the symbol, to show that this land is under our protection." Cassandra looks at him with an expression he can't decipher before she focuses on her sword again. "I will see to it that we'll have those with us from now on."

She looks at him again with that strange expression and he wonders if it is something like appreciation. He can't really tell, he's never seen that on her.

Just as they are about to settle down for the night, Carver has taken off his pants to let them dry and works elfroot paste into his feet again, one of the watchers whistles a warning. Carver scrambles to put on his breastplate. He grabs his sword and shield as a group of heavily armed strangers run towards them. A chill goes down his spine when he recognizes templar armor. These are templars gone rogue and apparently on a killing spree.

"Hold! We are not apostates." Cassandra yells at them, but they don't even slow down.

"I do not think they care, Seeker," Solas says, drawing a glyph on the ground and beckons Carver to step into it.

Carver winces when his foot reminds him that he's had no time to put on his boots yet. The glyph sings like lyrium and he can feel its effect under the soles of his feet. It calms him but a the same time the magic simmers under his skin like lightning. The mark on his hand seems to hum.

Templar attacks slam against the wall of the glyph, making it light up as it absorbs the power. The attackers run towards them, casting weakly until they have no reserve left. Carver jumps out of the glyph and attacks. He brings them down with a wide sweep of his shield and a kick against the knee and yells at them. "Stop attacking us, I'm a templar, we're not your enemies."

Through the slit in the helmet he catches a look at the eyes of the templar and cold dread runs down his back. They don't look human, those eyes. They don't even look alive. Red around black, dull and lifeless.

"What happened to you?"

The templar doesn't answer and the sounds they make don't seem human. The other templar is crawling around on elbows, legs dragging behind them, the sword in their hand blindly whacking at Carver's naked feet. He jumps out of the range, still hesitant to make the killing blow.

A bolt of lightning shoots through the one templar and then hits the other on the ground. They crumble down dead, their armor black and twisted by the energy.

"Your hesitancy speaks for your good heart," Solas says, his staff still crackling with lightning. "But you cannot afford this luxury with rogue templars. _They_ do not hesitate."

Cassandra comes over to them. "Like rabid dogs they attacked. They had no plan, no formation." She looks at Carver in his linen shirt and breastplate, glancing down to his naked legs and feet. "Are you alright?"

Carver holds his shield before his crotch, at least covering up his smalls. "Yeah, they were not good fighters. Rabid dogs sounds about right."

He takes the helmet off of one of the corpses to look at them. The eyes are burned black from Solas' attack but he can still see that it was a woman, young, younger than him. Taking the helmet from the other corpse he reveals a young man, possibly even younger than the other. Gaunt cheeks without a hint of stubble and the armor too big for those narrow shoulders.

"He can't be more than a recruit," Cassandra says. "And the other is not much older. Why did they attack us?"

"Did anybody see their eyes?"

"I was a bit too busy not getting beheaded to look at their eyes," Varric says as he stomps over with his crossbow over his shoulder. He has boots on and something like a short skirt and nothing else.

Carver files a long list of questions about Varric's nightly routine away for later and turns to Cassandra. "Their eyes were black and red. As if they were possessed. And I tried talking to them but..."

"We have a captive. His eyes look normal," Cassandra says. "You may be able to talk to him."

"Me?"

"You're the Herald."

Carver stares at her and waits for her to explain herself but she just points her chin towards the campfire. Finally he shrugs and walks over to the group of Inquisition soldiers who stand with their swords drawn around a kneeling man in templar armor.

Varric chuckles next to him as they walk. "That's a convenient excuse for her, isn't it? 'You're the Herald' and wouldn't you know, you got yourself another job."

Carver nods and picks his way carefully with his naked feet. He should have gotten his boots but he doesn't want to turn around. The moon gives enough light to see where he can step but he flinches when a thorn nicks the new blister on his heel.

The young man on the ground with his hands bound hardly looks like a templar. If it weren't for the armor and the helmet next to him, he would have looked like any of the bandits they've met during the day. He looks like a fresh recruit, as young as the other boy who now lies dead, burned and twisted up on the hill. But his eyes look indeed normal.

"What's your name and what Chantry were you stationed at?" Carver asks when the other former templars make room for him.

The young man looks up. "Are you the Herald?"

Carver can hear a few snickers behind him and rolls his eyes. He knows he doesn't look very impressive in his smalls and shirt. Slipping his left hand out from the shield band, he holds the palm towards the man. Green light glows in the cut and he wills it to shine brighter for a moment. He doesn't have much control over the rift light but if he concentrates, he can influence it a bit.

"There, glowy hand, Herald of Andraste," he grunts at the young man. "Now talk."

"My name is Ferlen, I'm from a farm near Ostagar. Templar recruiters came through and I joined, wanted to get away from the pigs and all. But then... we never even saw a chantry, they just took us to a base in a ruin and... they had armor for us but — " he looks down his dented breastplate. "There was still blood on this when they gave it to me. And then they gave us earthen flasks that we should drink from, said it's our lyrium but we weren't even trained yet. I know you're supposed to give your vows before you get lyrium and..."

He shudders, curling in on himself. Carver makes a gesture to the others to put their swords away, Ferlen doesn't look dangerous.

"I poured some of it out and it didn't look like lyrium."

"You know what lyrium looks like?" Varric asks.

"Well it ain't red innit?"

"Not the normal kind, no," Varric says quietly.

"The others drank it and it changed them. They stopped talking, hardly slept or ate."

"Do you still have that flask?" Carver asks.

"Yes, there in my bag." The young man, barely more than a boy, folds in on himself again. "I'm so hungry."

Carver cuts the ties from his hands and helps him up. "I think there's some rabbit stew left, go eat that. Don't do anything stupid and you can come with us."

The boy bows as he kneels, his forehead touching the ground. "Thank you, thank you Herald."

Carver sighs and waits for the boy to go before he picks up the small bag and finds the earthen flask in it. He hasn't even touched it yet, but he already feels the corrupted lyrium in it, its song like a false tone in his head. The mark on his hand seems to sing against it and he quickly puts flask back into the bag.

"Do you think you can trust him?" Varric wonders.

"I'm not killing him and I'm not sending him out alone into the hills. Maker's arse, he's a kid, he knows less than nugshit about life out here."

Carver waves Cassandra over and shows her the flask in the bag. "They're giving them corrupted lyrium. It must mess with their minds."

"Turning them into mindless attackers," Cassandra says with shock in her voice.

"Rabid dogs don't ask questions."

Cassandra gives him a look before she nods. "I would like to ask him a few questions myself."

"Go ahead, he's eating the rest of the stew over there. His name is Ferlen, be nice to him." Carver stretches his arms behind his head and yawns. "Who has first watch?" He looks around and two former templars step forward. They look capeable and determined.

"Your names?"

"I'm Michelle, that's Gernlem, Serah. Piert had to go into the bushes for a bit but he'll be on guard too."

Carver yawns again and gives a half hearted salut with his fist on his chest. "Good. Wake me for second watch."

"But Serah, you're the Herald."

"I take second watch with the others and that's it." Carver glares at Michelle until she nods.

"Understood, Serah."

Carver tiptoes back to his pack and lies down with a groan. His feet hurt but the bone deep tiredness comes from something else. Sleep is merciful and takes him quickly.

*~~~*

The world is not quite right. Walls are around him, tinted by green fog and he steps on familiar cobblestones that disappear when he lifts his feet. He looks up to the sky but it isn't the right color. The world seems to wobble around the edges, sections disappearing when he doesn't look at them.

He knows this place, it's the Alienage in Lowtown in Kirkwall. This is the way to Merrill's home. But when he steps into the square with the tree, it changes into a forest. The Lowtown tree is still there, right in the middle, surrounded by younger trees. Merrill and him had often sat under this tree, sharing their lunch.

She had kissed him there, under the one thick branch that gave them shade in the sun. New roots have grown from the ground but he soon finds that part of the tree again. White flowers grow on the branch, giving off a sweet smell. He parts two bushes to get closer and stops and stares.

There, in the exact same spot where she'd kissed him, sits Merrill.

She looks away from him and flowers from the tree branch adorn her head like a crown. Carver steps through the bushes and tiptoes towards her, afraid that any sound might destroy this mirage. He just wants to see her face, just once.

As if she can feel him approach, she suddenly turns around and a smile spreads on her face. "Carver!"

"Merrill?" He can't believe that she's real.

She jumps up and flies into his arms. "Vhenan, you're here."

He holds her and she feels real and all doubt leaves his mind. The way she smiles up to him makes his heart sing and he leans down and captures her lips in a kiss. Her hands go to his neck and she pulls him closer as she kisses him back, her sweet lips opening for him.

After endless time she pulls back and looks at him. Flower petals rain down all around them like snow.

"Vhenan," she says with a curious smile, "what are you doing in my dream?"


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A short chapter today but chapters are as long as they want, right? 
> 
> Have some Carver and Merrill!

* * *

* * *

 

"What do you mean _your_ dream?" Carver asks. "This could just as well be my dream."

A flower petal floats onto Merrill's head. He picks it up between his fingertips, feeling its silky texture.

Merrill smiles at him. "Do you often dream of flowers?"

"Well, I don't remember my dreams most of the time." The flower petal turns into a butterfly and flies away.

Merrill puts her hand on his cheek and whispers, "Ma I've'an'virelan, ma vhenan."

Carver leans into her touch. "What does that mean?"

Merrill giggles at that. "If this were _your_ dream, you would know. The dream can only use your own memory."

Carver traces her lips with his thumb, lost in her eyes. "But how do you know that I'm not just part of your memory?"

"When I dream of you, you're usually naked."

Carver feels his face heat up. "You dream of me naked?"

"Sometimes?" She giggles again and something in his chest snaps free.

"Merrill," he whispers like a prayer and leans down to kiss her again.

She meets him halfway, standing on her tiptoes and then she pulls him down and the ground shifts and the tree moves and they're lying in soft moss. She wraps her arms around him and throws her leg over his hip and kisses him again.

Her lips, soft but demanding have him shiver under his armor. When she lets go of him, it feels like he can breathe for the first time.

Merrill lies back on his arm with a happy sigh. "I think this is a bit more my dream than yours. I doubt that you've ever seen moss like this."

The moss feels soft like velvet and is bright green. Little pink flowers peek out from it. A circle of light holds the moss in place, separating it from the dark, unreal looking world around them.

Carver digs his fingers into the soft moss. "So if I'm dreaming and you're dreaming, how are we both here?"

"This is the Fade." Merrill points up to the sky and Carver follows her eyes. The sky looks like a storm in green clouds, rolling over their heads. But it's silent. In fact, everything is much too quiet. The only sound is a drone in the background that seems to be in tune with the lyrium in his veins.

"I've never been in the Fade," Carver says. "I'm not a mage."

"Maybe it has something to do with your hand?" Merrill points at his left hand and Carver notices for the first time that the mark doesn't hurt. He holds it up to inspect it. It looks very different. Instead of the harsh cut in the palm of his hand and the erratic light that lashes out of it, the green light now looks soft. Tendrils like gossamer threads wind around his hand, soft and caressing. In the dim light of the Fade, the green threads look lively and promising.

"Is that your Herald hand?"

"Yes, but it usually doesn't look like this." He closes his fist, watching the gossamer tendrils curl around it. When he opens his hand again, it looks like a flower opening up. "As if it's angry outside of the Fade."

Merrill takes his marked hand in hers and draws her finger through the gossamer light. It reacts to her, following her movements, wrapping around her finger and turning away again like tiny dancers.

Merrill smiles. "It's so pretty." She strokes over his hand and bumps against the armguard. "What's this armor you're wearing?"

Carver looks down on himself. "That's not my armor." At least it isn't the glittery golden thing he wears in the real world.

"No," Merrill says, tracing the griffon symbol on his chest plate. "That's the symbol of the Grey Wardens, is it not?"

"Yes, it is." It's the traditional Warden armor, blue and silver decorations on heavy plate. He can tell that this is a dream because the armor feels light and soft like linens. "Why am I wearing Warden armor?"

"Sometimes the light inside of you wants to tell you something. The Fade shows it to you."

"The Wardens..." Something nags in the back of Carver's mind but he can't grasp it. "The Grey Wardens..."

"Did you want to be a Warden when you grew up?" Merrill looks up to him with her pale green eyes and he completely forgets the thought that wants to come up in his mind.

"The Wardens always looked so dashing but so sad," Merrill says. "Isabela always went on about their stamina but why would that be good for you when you're sad all the time?" She strokes over the silver and blue armguard and Carver feels her touch on his skin as if the armguard isn't there. "But I like the blue, it looks good on you. You would have made a fine Warden."

Carver leans up and studies her face. He traces the lines on her face with his fingertip, commiting the pattern to memory. "I've missed you so much," he says.

"I've missed you too, ma vhenan." Merrill sits up and takes his marked hand. The green tendrils of light wind around her hand and stretch towards her face. Where they touch her skin, the gossamer threads light up. "It's beautiful."

"I've never seen it like this, it's so... harsh in the real world." Carver turns his hand and they watch the light swirl around until it settles again. He looks back to her face. She studies his mark with wonder but there is that inquisitiveness in her face that he remembers from when she worked on her mirror.

A change in tone around them has Carver and Merrill look up at the same time. A rock is floating above them and the drone in the background has turned grating, out of tune. "What is happening?" Carver asks.

Merrill stares at a spot in the distance. "I think you'll have to go."

"Why, what is it?" He can make out a figure in the background, walking under floating rocks. The trees make room for him where he passes.

"I've seen him a few times. I don't know who he is but he walks the Fade. A somniari. He hasn't found me yet but I think he's looking for us now."

Carver watches the figure. The Fade distorts the image, at times it looks like a four-legged animal walking, at other times like a tall man.

"What will happen if he finds us?"

Merrill moves her hand in a pattern and light flows from her hands into the moss. Flowery veins grow up, forming a shield to hide them. "I'm not sure but I'm worried about you. You shouldn't be here, you're not a mage."

Carver looks around. Their mossy little oasis with flowers and butterflies is frayed at the edges and rapidly shrinks.

"Spirits are curious about the waking world and when they find you... I'm not sure anymore what they'll do, the Fade has changed since the Breach." Merrill still moves her hand in a quiet dance and the veins twist into a thicker curtain.

But as Carver looks through a gap towards the distorted image, the figure turns abruptly, glowing white eyes fixating on him.

Merrill pulls him back, panic in her eyes. "You have to wake up."

"But you... ," Carver reaches out to her but she's already fading.

"I'll find you again, vhenan," Merrill says, her hand reaching for his face but not touching him. "Wake up now."

"Merrill!" he calls to her.

"Carver! Wake up!"

His own breath punches into his chest and he sits up on a swallowed scream. Tarp flaps softly in the wind and the light of the fire shines through into his tent.

"Merrill," he breathes out. "Merrill."

 

* * *

 


	9. Chapter 9

* * *

 

* * *

Gasping for breath, Carver feels the memories drifting away and he grasps what he can recall: Merrill smiling, green light, floating rocks, butterflies, Warden armor, hollow sounds, white eyes.

The tarp of the tent flaps softly in the wind and through the gap he can see the fire. He gets up, his heart is beating too fast to sleep anyway and he needs time to think. Putting on all his clothes and armor — not again will he risk being caught fighting in his smalls — gives him enough time to calm his breath.

Merrill. He has seen Merrill. Kissed her!

It had been the Fade but it had felt so real.

Outside, the second moon has risen, giving the night a sharp silver light with inky black shadows. The fire with its yellow flicker looks like it doesn't belong in this world of dark shadows.

The guard next to his tent, Michelle, nods at him and gives a hand signal to another guard in templar armor. The newly painted inquisition symbol on their chests stands out white in the moonlight. Carver walks towards the fire to drink a ladle of water from the leather skin. He listens to the sounds of the night, the crackling of the fire, the scurrying of small animals in the bushes, the call of an owl somewhere above him. He has missed this the most in Kirkwall, the quiet sounds of nature. There wasn't a single night at the Gallows where you could hear something as innocent as the hooting of an owl.

Just outside of the light of the fire, the owl sweeps down and the squeak of an animal pulls him out of his reminiscence. Maybe life out here actually isn't quite so peaceful.

Carver steps back into the darkness, waiting a few moments for his eyes to adjust. He flexes his left hand, focussing on the green light in his palm. Gone are the soft tendrils of light, once again it flickers with sharp spikes, even hisses as he wills it to light up.

Making his way around the camp, he passes the tents. Snoring comes from Cassandra's and Varric's tents, both in a similar rhythm and he grins to himself. He's pretty sure that both would deny that they snore in tune.

One small tent sits further outside of the camp, it's barely more than a tarp hung over a rope. But looking straight at it, it melts into the background, as if it's not even there. Carver steps closer. Something creeps up his legs, cold and thorny and the tent shifts again. He knows this feeling, he has crossed a magical ward. Even though Circle mages were forbidden to set them up on their own, they did practice them sometimes, under a close watch by templars. Carver remembers how it felt to cross a ward like that, how it made it difficult to move, but this is no ward from a Circle mage. The very air traps his legs where he stands, he can hardly move and nausea crawls up his throat.

Carver draws a deep breath and calls upon his templar powers to nullify the magic in the ward. A blast of Spell Purge frees his feet and he steps closer to the shifting tent, only to be caught in another ward again. He fights, gathering the power of the lyrium in his veins when with a jolt, the wards disappear. He stumbles, almost falls flat on his face from the sudden lack of resistance in the air.

Solas steps out of the perfectly normal looking tent, a frown on his forehead.

Carver shakes off the retreating nausea. "What in the Maker's name was that?"

"I apologize," Solas says with a curt bow. "Whenever I venture into the Fade, I set up wards to protect myself. My travels take me deep into the Fade, my body would be vulnerable in the waking world without the protection."

"Those were some impressive wards," Carver says, keeping an eye on the tarp innocently flapping in the wind. The way it tried to disappear from his vision as he approached it, deeply unnerves him. One should be able to trust what one sees.

"As I said before, my knowledge of magic exceeds what your average Circle mage is allowed to learn."

"You always set up these kind of wards when you go to sleep?"

"It is necessary that I protect my sleeping form."

Carver flexes his Herald hand again, remembering how it had looked in the Fade. "When you enter the Fade, what exactly are you doing there?"

"As a non-mage, such things may be difficult to imagine," Solas says with a smile that reads more condescending than friendly to Carver. "I’ve journeyed deep into the Fade, in ancient ruins and battlefields, to see the dreams of lost civilizations. I’ve watched as hosts of spirits clashed to re-enact the bloody past in ancient wars both famous and forgotten."

"Can you interact with those spirits?"

Solas looks at him and for a moment the smile on his face disappears. "What strange questions you ask." His smile returns, a little too quickly, and he lowers his head. "Mostly I'm just watching how ancient heroes have fought in the past. Every great war has its heroes. I’m curious what kind you’ll be."

"Aren't we all," Carver says quietly, more to himself than to Solas. "Those places you visit in the Fade, they were once real?"

"As real as all we see. Battlefields steeped in death, ancient buildings that withstood the rigors of time. They all attract spirits. These spirits press against the veil, weakening the barrier between our worlds. When I dream in such places, I find memories no other living being has ever seen."

Carver keeps looking at his Herald hand, willing the green light to glow. It sparks and twitches. "Do you ever meet people you know in the Fade?"

Solas glances at him with a frown. "Spirits and demons live in the Fade, not real people. I find remnants of dreams, sometimes thousands of years old, memories of great wars and warriors and the thrill..." He let's the sentence trail off. "I have not known templars to ask me questions like that."

"I'm not a templar anymore."

"Your inquisitiveness is commendable — "

"I was in the Fade last night," Carver interrupts him.

"The Fade is unlike any dream a non-mage like you could know," Solas says with another polite incline of his head.

"I know," Carver says. "But it wasn't a dream, it was the Fade and I..."

"That's impossible," Solas shouts, suddenly appearing to be taller, imposing even, staring him down. "You're not a mage. The Fade is not open to you."

"Trust me, I'm well aware." Carver holds Solas' gaze and the mage returns to his normal, unimposing self again. Once again, Carver has to question how much he can trust his own eyes.  "I met my... I met a... a friend in the Fade."

"A spirit?" Solas asks softly.

"No, a person, a very good friend, a mage. I spoke to her."

Solas studies him as if he sees him for the first time. He takes hold of Carver's glowing hand and his magic brushes against the mark like an invisible touch.

"I must admit," Solas says, "I find this most unsettling. As much as I have studied your mark, a Fade connection has never occured to me."

"Do you think it'll happen again?"

Solas still stares at Carver's marked hand, his eyes glassy as he is deep in thought. "I am unable to say. It will require further study."

He turns abruptly and walks back to his tent.

"What, now? Are you going back into the Fade?" Carver calls after him.

"I must. I need to research this. If the veil is so thin in this area..." Solas waves his hand in a complicated form. "I'm setting up my wards again but they will not affect you."

Carver still takes two steps back. The feeling of being held by thorny air is still fresh in his mind and he doesn't want to repeat the experience so soon. In front of his feet, wards glow in white patterns on the ground for a moment and disappear again.

"Don't take too long though, I'm relieving that guard over there for now. But the sun will come up soon and then we'll have to get going."

"You can leave me here, I'll be protected."

Carver shakes his head. "Ehm, no, sorry, but you're our only mage in this whole magical craziness. I need you with us."

The frown on Solas' forehead softens and he inclines his head towards Carver. "Very well. Please wake me when we pack up." With that he ducks under the tarp and white patterns light up all over it.

Carver walks over to the guard, who is about to fall asleep where he stands, and orders him to take some rest. When he looks back to Solas' tent, it seems to try to disappear again.

Not being able to trust his own eyes has become an unnerving new normal for him.

*~~~*

It takes them another two days of traipsing through the countryside to get close to the Crossroads, interrupted by various bandits, brainwashed templars and even a group of mages. Lost circle mages in this case, starved and barely able to take care of themselves. They quickly abandon the idea of attacking them for the promise of protection and soup.

Having a group of mages with them, brings a whole new slew of problems with it. Even it they're inquisition soldiers now, their guards with the blinding white Inquisition symbol on their cuirasses have been templars for most of their lives. They have accepted Solas so far, for reasons Carver doesn't quite understand, but the circle mages somehow bring out the worst in them.

"Herald, the mages refuse to stay in their assigned section of the..."

"Fucking void, Gernlem," Carver interrupts the young guard, "they're not prisoners, they can go where they want."

"But what if..."

"What if what? What if they do magic?" This is the third time someone has complained to him about the mages and Carver has quite enough of it. "They've been doing magic for as long as you have been swinging that sword, they won't encase you in ice, unless you ask for it."

"But Serah..."

"Just be on watch and let the mages be."

The young man bows, hiding his face behind his shield. "Yes, Herald, as you say." He salutes and turns back to the trek.

Varric appears at Carver's side. "A word, Junior?"

"What?" Irritation makes his voice sound hard and he isn't even sure why he is so angry.

"Save your breath, I'm not here to tell you what to do."

Carver stops walking and stretches his back. "I'm sorry. You know, I would love to have someone tell me what to do for a change."

Varric pulls Carver to the side and hands him a waterskin. The trek of Inquisition soldiers and mages slowly moves past them as they drink. Cassandra glares at them but keeps on walking.

"Junior, not everyone is as easy around mages as you are. You've lived with apostates for as long as you remember. But a kid like that, all he's been told is that mages will kill him if he doesn't smite them first."

"Shit." Carver kicks a rock, causing a fennec to run away with its long ears flapping. "All this fear and now with the Breach, people gonna start killing each other." The last group of inquisition soldiers trots past them and they follow them at a distance.

Varric hurries to keep up with him. "Carver, you're working against hundreds of years of chantry doctrine. 'Magic exists to serve man, and never to rule over him' and all that. You have to give people some time."

"I don't know if we have that much time," Carver says. "I'm gonna have to talk to Gernlem, am I?"

"Afraid so."

"Thanks, Varric."

"Anytime, Junior."

Carver hurries to catch up to the young man, Gernlem, who trots after the trek with his head hanging low.

"Gernlem, can we talk for a moment?"

"Yes, Herald." The young man bows his head respectfully and falls into step with Carver.

"I know this is difficult and it goes against everything you know but I want the Inquisition to be a place where everybody is welcome. This will not be a new chantry and templar order."

"But as templars, it's our divine right..."

"We're not templars anymore."

"Of course, Herald, I just... I don't know how else to do this." Gernlem looks truly troubled, not malicious, as his worldview crumbles around him.

Carver puts a hand on his shoulder, metal gauntlet scraping against templar shoulderguard. "I understand, really, but you have to see mages as people like you and me. Your job here is to protect everyone, no matter who or what they are."

"What if one loses control?"

"Then you'll do what is necessary to protect everyone. And I mean everyone," Carver says. "My father was a mage, my two sisters are both mages and yet I still live. An angry man or woman with a sword is just as dangerous as an angry man or woman with magic. We'll have to find a way to live peacefully together."

Gernlem nods slowly. "There was a boy, worked as a stable boy on our farm and one day, my father caught him doing magic and had him taken away by templars. He was just putting some ice on my sister's ankle, she'd tripped and sprained it and he was just helping. A few hours later, he was gone, we had noone to work the stables and my sister couldn't walk for days and was crying all the time."

"And you thought it was right."

The young ex-templar looks up to him. "Yes, everybody said so."

Carver sighs again and rubs his temples. "I understand that this goes against everything you've learned. Andraste's arse, I've learned all this too. But we can't keep going on like this, fighting among each other."

Gernlem turns his helmet in his hands. "It's just... I've lost friends in this mage war you know and now they look at me like... like..."

"Like they've lost friends too? They probably have."

Gernlem is silent for a long time, his helmet turning and turning as he keeps walking. Finally, he looks up. "You're the Herald of Andraste. If this is the path you think we should go, then I will follow you."

"Thank you," Carver says, hiding his discomfort at being addressed like that.

Gernlem bows and then hurries to join the other ex-templars.

Varric comes to his side with a chuckle. "Have you told Cassandra of your grand plans for the Inquisition yet?"

"Not in all details."

This time Varric laughs out. "Oh, please let me be there when you do, I want to see her reaction."

Carver ignores his remark.

But Varric can't let up. "I'm so glad that the Herald of Andraste knows the path."

"Shut up," Carver grunts at him. "I'm not even sure about the path to the forward scout camp."

"We'll get there, Junior, we'll get there."

They only get lost once on the way.

*~~~*

The scout camp sits atop a beautiful hill, with sturdy tents built in the shade of old trees. A pretty dwarf lady with a captivating smile greets them as they drag themselves into the camp on sore feet.

"The Herald of Andraste, a pleasure to finally meet you. I'm Lace Harding," she says, looking amused as Carver more or less falls to the ground, pulling his boots from his feet. "I see you had a tough journey."

Carver groans. "I haven't walked this much in the last ten years combined, I'm sure. My blisters have blisters."

"We have ointment and potions here," Scout Harding says and turns to a sturdy table at the side. "Some elfroot salve should help but please use it sparingly, we're almost out of elfroot."

Cassandra leans her shield against a tent and unlaces her boots as well. Her feet also bear the marks of the long walk. "We have elfroot with us," she says as she sits down on a log. "The Herald insisted on collecting it whenever we came across it."

"Good thinking, Herald," Harding says.

Carver puts his sword and shield to the side and lies back, stretching out his sore back muscles. "Why do you all have to call me The Herald? My name is Carver."

"I find myself incapable of calling you by that name," Cassandra says, "I could call you Hawke?"

"Oh void, no, that's my sister." Carver shakes his head. He unties a cloth bag from his hip and holds it out for Harding to pick up. "That's the elfroot, it should still be good."

"I see that you know what you're doing," Harding says.

"I saw people who survived the battle of Ostagar, only to die from an infection because we didn't have any elfroot." He closes his eyes, letting the memories of that cursed battle wash over him.

"Your group is larger than we expected." Harding has climbed on a rock to look over everyone.

"We picked up a group of circle mages, who have agreed to join us," Cassandra explains. "They are not used to living outside of the Circle's routine and protection."

Carver bristles at calling the Circle a protection but he's too tired to argue.

He wakes to the smell of fresh stew.

"Herald," Cassandra says next to him, holding out a bowl of stew.

Carver sits up and digs into the food before he is even fully awake. "Thank you," he mumbles between spoonfuls of thick stew. His feet feel much better but he doesn't look forward to putting his boots back on.

With the stew settling in his stomach and some fresh water to drink, Carver begins to feel like a person again. He waves Scout Harding over, who is engaged in a conversation with Varric but doesn't look quite happy about it.

"Yes, Herald?" she says, leaving a strangely flustered Varric behind.

"Did Varric bother you?"

"No, he just asked if I've ever been in Kirkwall, cause then I would be Harding in Hightown, and I'm not sure what he means by that."

"I swear, his jokes are usually better than that, you must make him nervous."

Lace Harding snickers at that and blushes adorably.

Carver treats himself to a fresh pair of socks and begins the dreaded process of putting his boots back on. The elfroot salve and a minor health potion have helped to heal his feet and other scrapes and bruises but with the distances they have to cover, his feet will hurt again soon enough.

"Harding, in the long run... oh the irony," he says with a chuckle, "in the long run we can't run this Inquisition by running on foot all the time."

"Hah, good one, Junior, let me write that down," Varric says as he comes over.

Scout Harding also laughs. "Sister Nightingale never said that you're funny."

"I have my moments." He pulls the laces of his boots tight and his surprised how well the elfroot salve has worked. At least for now, he can walk pain free. "We need horses for the Inquisition, do you know where we could get some? Preferably as a donation."

Harding nods thoughtfully. "I see. Around here we say that Master Dennet has the best horses. Hardy, fereldan breeds. He might be open to help the Inquisition if the Inquisition helps in securing the place." She points down the hill. "Down there is the King's Highway, if the wind stands right, you can hear the fighting all the way up here. The farms have been safe so far, but rogue templars and rebel mages are moving along the highway towards Redcliffe Castle. It's only a matter of time until the farms are drawn into the conflict."

Carver nods and adjusts his armor. "Please send a raven to Sister Nightingale that we're going to talk to Master Dennet about horses. But first we have to get to the Crossroads and I'm supposed to speak to this Mother Giselle."

"She's helping the refugees at the Crossroads," Harding says. "She's supposed to have influence on whatever has remained of the chantry but she's truly a good person, doing what is right."

"I don't care much for the chantry but we need helpers like her," Carver says. "People out here have to see that the Inquisition helps everybody, mages and non-mages."

Scout Harding looks at him with interest. "Is that your plan for the Inquisition?"

Varric chuckles quietly. "Junior here keeps surprising us all the time."

Carver stretches his neck, trying to shake of the tiredness from the travel. "I only hope this won't go up in flames around me."

"I'll keep Cassandra away from the matches," Varric says with a straight face.

"Very helpful, Varric."

* * *

 


	10. Chapter 10

 

 

* * *

 

Cassandra comes up to him, her armor padded with grey and white fur. "I apologize, Herald, that I couldn't provide you with appropriate furs for this climate."

Carver shakes his head. "This cold is unusual, nobody could have known that we need such warm clothes. As far as I know, at this time of the year, this area is usually nice and pleasant if a bit rainy."

Varric joins them on the trampled path, just wide enough for the mule and the cart, that leads them in a curve around a mountain ridge. They left most of their templar squad at the Crossroads to protect the refugee camp and only took six of them out here into the country. Two of them are archers and are currently hunting and shooting rams to provide food for the refugee camp.

The list of things that Carver has agreed to do for the refugees has gotten so long,  he had to borrow Varric's ink and paper to write it all down. On top of that list is food, preferably ram's meat because it can be smoked and made to last longer. The second point is blankets and coats. It makes Carver deeply uncomfortable to search abandoned farm houses for these things but they need them and they can hardly go into a store and buy them, out here in the country. If they even had the money.

"Varric, I never thought I'd see the day where you cover up that chest hair," Carver says with a grin.

"It pains me, Junior, it really does. Depriving Cassandra of that lovely view seems to be too cruel for words."

Cassandra groans bitterly, a noise that has become quite familiar by now. Especially Varric draws her disapproval quite often and it only seems to encourage him.

"Herald, I think we have enough rams for now, the cart might get too heavy," Cassandra says, pointing at the pile of animals on the rather rickety cart.

"Yes, I agree." Carver looks along the path. "I think there's a farm over there. Let's check there for resources and then we'll send the cart back. And then... we have to find this horse master."

Varric sighs and looks up to Carver with a pained smile. "You know, as much as I hate walking in all this annoying nature, have you ever seen a dwarf on a horse?"

"No, but I'm looking forward to it," Carver says, fighting not to show a grin on his face.

"Yeah, yeah, laugh it up, make fun of the dwarf, why don't you?"

Someone snorts with a giggle behind them and as Carver and Varric turn around, they catch Cassandra, deep red in the face, unsuccessfully suppressing a giggle with her hand to her mouth.

"You too, Seeker?" Varric calls out, clutching his chest. His hand sinks into the heavy scarf which makes it look less dramatic but it's still enough to send the Seeker into an embarrassed stutter.

"I apologize, I did not mean to..."

Carver interrupts her. "Don't apologize, he's just messing with you."

Cassandra harrumphs, muttering something like "I should have known," and turns on the spot to get away from them.

"Darn, I shouldn't have done that," Varric says and shakes his head. "I think she was just starting to like me."

Carver grins at him. "That may be too much to hope for, but who can say?"

"You mean my famous charms are no sure path to the Seeker's heart?"

"You're the expert here, aren't you?" Carver flexes his hands. "I'm sticking to demons and glowing hands, rather than giving you advice in how to charm the Seeker."

Carver walks up to the farm house, looking for signs of occupation. The garden seems to have been neglected weeks ago, dry leaves crinkling as he walks through to the front door. He knocks, out of general politeness, not because he expects anyone to answer. The door opens easily and Carver quickly searches through chests for clothing and wraps everything in the blankets on the bed.

"There's a letter here," Varric says quietly.

Carver stops packing. "Does it say that they will be back?"

Varric shakes his head. "The guy calls himself Hyndel and he writes to his father:

 _I'm going into the mountains to join the people up there. They're making sense right now, when the rest of the world is not. We can't tend the fields since Master Dennet and his wife sent us all away for safety, and I can't just stay here and watch the refugees starve outside our home._ _  
_ _You and Mother should come, Father. You'll be safe up there. The mages have no quarrel with the people in the mountains, and even the templars don't harass them. Nowhere else outside of Redcliffe is safe from this Maker-cursed war or the demons pouring out of the sky._

And then some angry remarks how they won't give up their land and will end up as burned corpses."

"Morbid," Carver says and continues piling clothes onto the blankets. "I wonder who that is, the people in the mountains?"

"Damned if I know, could be dwarfs?" Varric shudders. "Not that I understand that mountain obsession myself but it's a thing for a lot of dwarfs."

They leave the small house and Carver adds the pile of blankets and clothes to the cart and sends it on its way. With the soldiers gone to protect cart, they are now down to one archer and two warriors, in addition to Solas, Cassandra and Varric.

Cassandra studies the map Scout Harding has given them. It's not very detailed and she had asked them to add landmarks and pathways to it as they discover them. "I think, if we follow this mountain ridge, we should find a good place to establish a camp there by the river." Cassandra points to a squiggly line that someone seems to have added to the map with an uncertain hand. "The Redcliffe farms should be close by that river."

Carver agrees and jumps back down towards the path they had been walking on, finding his footing, when something makes him stop. The back of his neck prickles, the hairs standing up. He doesn't need to look at his Herald-hand to know that the mark has started to hiss and glow again.

Solas appears at his side, his magic drawing a blue pattern on the ground with every step. "There's a rift close by."

"I can feel it too." Carver holds his hand up, the green light breaking out of the cut in his palm like a tiny explosion. "What do you think we can expect? Another giant Pride Demon like with the big one?"

Solas draws a shape in the air and a tiny light floats away like a moth. He closes his eyes, a frown on his forehead as he concentrates. "They are waiting. Demons and wraiths, drawing power from the rift, from the Fade into our world." Solas lets his hand sink and his frown evens out. "I would assume that the power is not enough to support a Pride Demon. But you're right to be careful."

"What if we come across a rift where the demons are too strong for me and the mark?" Carver watches Solas closely. His reactions are always so very controlled and he wonders if the mage hides more than he lets on.

"The mark..." Solas looks up to Carver. "It's not killing you anymore but it is changing. I can feel its magic adapt, gathering strength and finesse from you. It is adapting to you as much as you are adapting to it."

"You mean it could get stronger?"

"More capable, I might call it. As your focus improves, your abilities will increase. The mark," he takes his Herald-hand in his and strokes his finger over the glowing cut, gentle like a lovers caress, "it grows stronger with you."

Carver has the distinct feeling that Solas is not saying everything he could say. But before he can pry any further, the rift changes and the ominous drone draws everyone's attention to it.

Demons rise from the ground and Cassandra draws her sword and runs to it, followed by the three Inquisition soldiers.

"No, no, wait!" Carver calls after them but it's too late. Cassandra and the soldiers are already attacking the first demons, only the archer staying a few paces back. Carver directs Varric to a high rise with a quick gesture and feels more than sees that Solas has already placed a ward glyph on the ground and stays to attack from the back.

Cassandra is decimating a demon quite efficiently but the young soldiers are trapped between two demons and getting hit with green magic bolts from wraiths. Carver runs towards them, cutting the first demon from head to slithering base and shoves the inexperienced soldier out of the way to attack the other. Solas' electric flashes keep the wraiths at bay but as he strikes the demon down, three others rise from the ground next to him.

"Herald!" Cassandra cries out and rushes to his side.

The energy of the rift is crawling cold up his neck and he raises his shield as he hacks at the demon in front of him, to let the mark work on the rift. But Cassandra pushes him and as he stumbles, he loses the connection of light to the rift.

"What in the...?" Carver yells as he turns to her, only to realize that she saved him from getting swallowed by a fiery demon.

"Herald, the rift!" Solas yells from behind, his face tight in concentration.

Carver jumps away from the fight, focusses on the rift and throws whatever his Herald-hand gives him against the rift. It screeches, disformations rippling over the crystalline shape and with a snapping sound it turns into green fog. In the same moment, the demons shrink, their movements halted and the wraiths disappear.

Solas comes closer, wards stretching out around his feet, making the demons hiss and shriek when they touch them. "They are weakened now but it won't last long."

"Spread out!" Carver orders as he hits the demon hovering next to him. "We hinder each other like this."

"But we have to protect you." Cassandra stares at him, furiously plunging her sword into a demon until it goes down.

"I can't close the rift if you all trap me."

"But you are — "

"Hey!" Varric cocks his crossbow. "It's changing again."

Solas moves back, readying ice-blue magic in his hand.

The ground breaks up in several places, green fog rushing out of it. "Spread out," Carver orders again, "watch those things."

Cassandra looks like she wants to disagree again but Varric interrupts her. "I'll protect him, Seeker."

The loud hum drones in their ears and the rift turns into a crystal again. This time, the fight works better, his companions keeping the demons busy so that Carver can get close to the rift and focus the golden lightning from his hand on it. Varric's bolts whirr past his head and hit a demon that tries to break his concentration. With a final pull, the crystal flies apart and the rift closes.

Carver takes his helmet off and wipes sweat from his forehead. His whole arm is aching, even though the mark has shrunk back down to a green glowing cut.

Cassandra comes up to him. "Are you alright?"

Carver glares at her. "Yes, Andraste's arse, what were you thinking?"

Cassandra recoils, snarling at him. "You are the Herald and our only chance to close the rift. I will not risk— "

"Alright!" Carver scrapes together all the calm he has stored away somewhere in the back of his mind. "I apologize for snapping at you. But you have to agree that this was a bad fight, we weren't efficient, we weren't coordinated and by the void! We were lucky that we didn't lose anybody." He looks around at the sudden silence. "We didn't, did we?"

Everyone looks around, counting the others and checking their own limbs for functionality by shaking them. It looks like a marionette player had to sneeze.

"Jem here got a bit of a burn," the archer says. The soldier in question glares at her and shakes his head.

"It's not to worry, just a bit of demon acid." He holds out his arm and Cassandra grabs elfroot salve from her pack. The acid has crawled into the gap of his arm guards and Carver makes him take it all off to wash the acid out.

A small spring nearby seems a good place as any to rest, fill up the waterskins and clean everyone's armor from demon residue. The water is fresh and clean and a few sweet berries nearby are a welcome snack.

Carver sits down next to Cassandra and waves Varric and Solas over to them. "We need a strategy."

"I agree," Cassandra says, "and I apologize for running into the fray like that. I must admit, it has been a while that I had to coordinate my fighting with anybody else."

"You and me, we're used to run out in front as vanguards," Carver says.

"The rift forces us into a circular battlefield," Solas says. "Demons and wraiths can shift, disappear and appear elsewhere."

"A frontal approach makes no sense," Cassandra says. "And it's too dangerous for the Herald."

"I'm right here, you know?" Carver says, popping another berry into his mouth.

Cassandra draws a circle in the dirt with a stick and scratches a crude star in the center. "First and foremost, the Herald has to get to the rift."

"I agree," Solas says with a strange air of authority around him. "Whenever Carver focuses the mark on the rift, it weakens the creatures from the Fade."

Varric nods. "That's an advantage we shouldn't lose sight of. We're ass deep in demons as it is, who knows what else can come through these rifts."

Cassandra draws three dots around the circle in the dirt. "We have two archers and one mage, they attack the creatures from the outside. The Herald and one or two protectors move towards the center until the mark can interact with the rift."

"Two protectors at least, three if possible." Carver waves the three young soldiers over and explains what the drawing means.

The archer nods as she sees her position and the other two look at Carver, waiting for their orders.

"What are you trained as?" Carver asks them. "And tell me your names."

"Name's Lupas, I'm best with sword and shield," says the taller one, his wide shoulders telling of his training.

The other soldier is smaller, more lithe, and he pulls out two long daggers. "Jemmeny, I got some rogue training. But I'm good with a sword too."

"Alright." Carver looks at the drawing again and then at Cassandra. "If rifts are close by, I can sense them, Solas as well. That gives us time to prepare."

Cassandra inclines her head. "I will wait for your command, Herald."

Carver gives a curt nod and is relieved to see a rare smile on Cassandra's face. He turns to the map again. "Long range fighters take up position around the rift, the rest, we go in diamond formation towards the rift. Cassandra on my left, I can't protect myself on the left when I'm busy with the rift, Lupas on my right. Jemmeny behind us." He looks at the young man. "You're our eyes in the back, you speak up when shit comes your way."

"Yes, Sir."

Carver stands up and tightens the straps of his armor. "Suit up and let's find the farms and Master Dennet. I want a damn horse."

*~~~*

Of course, it couldn't possibly be easy for once. They find the cluster of farmhouses soon after leaving the spring but Master Dennet drives a hard bargain for the horses. He wants them to find positions for watchtowers to secure the area and his wife demands that they deal with a horde of wolves who keep attacking the farms.

At least they can use resources from the deserted houses to set up a camp by the river. Carver groans when he pulls off his boots and lies back. It's only supposed to be a short break and he's convinced that he can't sleep but the soft tingling of the water stream lulls him into a deep sleep.

"Herald, Ser."

"Whua?" Carver wakes with a start. Images are fleeing from his mind, nothing he quite recognizes but the feeling is familiar.

"Ser Herald, you said to wake you before midday."

"Thanks," he grumbles and stumbles over to the small fire.

Hunger gnaws in Carver's stomach, familiar hunger that cannot be stilled by the bread and cheese Varric hands to him. He tries to ignore it but it burns like acid, making it hard to think.

Varric looks at him with a frown. "What's the matter, Junior?"

"Hunger." Carver holds his hands on his stomach, trying to calm his innards and also to hide the tremor of his hands.

"You want more bread?"

"Not that kind of hunger."

Varric stares at him for a moment until understanding dawns on his face. "Oh, that hunger. Don't you have lyrium with you?"

"Yes, but..."

Varric sits down next to him and waits.

Carver breathes against the hunger and wills his hands to stop trembling. "I thought without the chantry supplying us with templar vials, it would be better to save up. And also — " he flexes his Herald-hand, watching the green light lick the edges of the cut. "We don't know how the mark interacts with the lyrium. What if it weakens it, what if the mark could be stronger?"

Varric nods, taking a few moments to answer. "Carver, those are all good thoughts but out here in the fields? Not a good place or point in time to test that. Once we're back in Haven, I'll send out a few letters to people I know, I'm sure we can get our hands on templar vials, bypassing the chantry."

"Thanks, Varric."

"Now, take your lyrium, we need you sharp for the next batch of demons." Varric looks around, his eyes following a raven flying past them. "When we're back in Haven, let's have a chat with Cassandra about how to best get you off the stuff, without the worst of the withdrawal."

Carver nods and feels around in his pocket for the reassuring shape of the vial. "You know about the withdrawal?"

Varric nods. "You ever heard of Samson when you were in the Gallows?"

"Knight-Commander Meredith kicked him out before I got there. I think he was helping a mage, smuggled out his letters."

"Hawke ran into him at some point, he was helping mages to find places to hide from templars. I saw him after the Deep Roads expedition, he was..." Varric gives him a look. "He was not in good shape. Forgot his own name sometimes, he was rambling, shouting at nothing, he... Junior, I wouldn't wish that on my enemy and definitely not on you."

Carver holds out the small vial. The liquid glows softly in blue and his hunger screams for it. He quickly opens it and drinks it down, letting it run down his throat like liquid ice. The world falls silent for a moment and then slams back into his mind, all his senses hyper aware, noise thrashing down on him, light eating his eyes. He gnashes his teeth until the sensations recede and the world goes back to normal.

Varric watches him, concerned. "Better now?"

Strength and confidence returning, Carver stands up and stretches his shoulders. "Much better. Let's find these wolves."

"As you say, Herald," Varric says and shoulders his crossbow. "Cassandra will be happy to see that you're feeling better. Maybe she'll even smile again."

Carver looks over his shoulder to Varric as he fastens his armor. "You want to make Cassandra smile?"

"I'm keeping a tally. You made her smile twice today, that gets you a special mention."

"In the book you're writing?"

"Where else?" Varric grins at him. "Someone has to write down the glorious adventures of Carver Hawke, Herald of Andraste. It will be grand and romantic."

"Romantic?"

"People want romance. If you didn't have your Daisy, Cassandra would be perfect for you but don't let her hear that."

Carver laughs out. "Never."

"Maybe our mighty Seeker could be interested in a charming dwarf..." Varric looks over to Cassandra on the other side of the camp, a soft smile on his face.

"Weren't you sweet on Bethany?" Carver asks as he comes back to Varric's side.

Varric looks up to him with a frown. "Your sister is like my sister. I love her and worry about her."

"Yeah, me too," Carver says softly. "I wonder where they are now, Merrill, Marian and Bethany."

"I got no new ravens," Varric says. "I just hope it isn't as cold where they are, Daisy has never quite gotten used to wearing shoes."

Carver shakes his head with a smile. "No, she hasn't. I brought her winter boots but she never liked wearing them, even when we had snow up to our knees."

They keep on reminiscing about Kirkwall as they climb up a mountain path with Solas and Cassandra. Varric tells him of jobs he did with Hawke that Carver has never heard about. Cassandra listens to the stories as well, occasionally asking for some detail.

Varric and Carver fall back a bit as they look for wolf tracks and Varric pulls Carver down by his shoulder to whisper, "Cassandra still asks me about my book."

"The one about the champion?"

"Yes, I think it's the reason why she tried to find Hawke for the Inquisition in the first place."

"Half of it is not even true."

"You read my book?" Varric calls out. "I'm touched."

"It was either that or some interpretation of the Chant of Light."

"Still, I'm glad my book won out."

Solas is the one who finds wolf tracks and leads them over the hillside to a small waterfall. After a short climb over slippery rocks, they come upon a clearing in front of a cave, where four wolves attack them right away. The wolves are relentless and it takes them a surprising long time to kill them.

"These wolves behave strangely," Solas says.

As they enter the cave, another pack of wolves attacks them, along with a demon that looks like a giant insect.

"That is a terror demon," Cassandra calls out.

"It explains why the wolves were going crazy," Varric shouts as he shoots the demon as fast as he can.

When the demon is finally down and the wolves as well, they are all exhausted. Cassandra leans against the stone with ancient carvings, drinking a potion. Solas kneels down next to a wolf, mumbling words in a foreign language as he gathers his strength. Carver feels fine but he knows that it's partially the fresh templar lyrium that lets him ignore his exhaustion.

As they follow the water back towards the farms, the hairs on Carver's neck stand up. "Hold! There's a rift."

"We only have one archer," Cassandra says, "and no second protector."

"We'll be fine," Carver says, confidence singing in his veins. He waits for Varric and Solas to find a higher position and then stomps through the shallow water towards the green glimmering rift. The rift hums at him, the mark on his Herald-hand sizzling, and he readies his sword.

The demons take notice of them, the giant terrors quickly trapping them as fiery demons slither towards them. Carver and Cassandra hack away at their gnarly limps but these demons are tough and and they have long range attacks. Lighting shoots from hunched over figures, blue and freezing and it slows them down. Despite their best efforts, Carver doesn't get any closer to the rift. He feels his strength drain from him and Cassandra cries out when one terror gets past her sword and hits her arm with a claw.

"We have to fall back!" Cassandra yells.

"We'll be fine," Carver repeats and plunges his sword into a demon that has slithered dangerously close.

"I could use some help here," Varric yells from the back. Another terror has appeared and closes in on Varric, whose bolts do little to slow the monster down.

Solas turns to aim his ice attacks at the terror approaching Varric, his face contorted in concentration. "I cannot hold out much longer."

"Herald!" Cassandra calls out. She's bleeding from a gash across her shoulder, dripping down the plate of her armor.

"We'll be — "

"No, Herald," Cassandra says, her eyes pleading with him. "That's the lyrium speaking."

The realization hits Carver like a brick. His confidence is grounded in the drug, not reality. That's what the templar vials do, they make one feel strong and invincible. He has seen templars fall before, blinded by their own overconfidence.

"Fall back! Run!" He turns and hacks a path for Cassandra and him.

As fast as they can, fighting off the terrors, they run towards Varric and Solas, protected by their long range attacks. Carver turns around as the noise gets quieter. The hum has shifted in tone and his mark has calmed to a soft green light. The demons stop following them, sticking close to the green fog of the rift.

"I think we're safe," Carver says and sits down on a boulder. Even with the strength of the lyrium singing in his body, he feels exhausted. Cassandra and Solas look even worse, sweat pearling on their foreheads. Varric unceremoniously falls down and heaves in air as he lies flat on his back.

"That was bad, I'm sorry, I thought..." Carver hides his face in his hands.

Cassandra comes over to him after long moments of silence and hands him a health potion. He takes it with a grateful nod, only now noticing the aches and pains all over his body.

The Seeker drinks her own potion and then sits down next to him. "I'm afraid we have a lot to discuss, Herald."

"Oh, I agree." Carver wipes the demon blood from his blade and sheathes it. "We need to get back to Haven."

*~~~*

  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If I would give chapters titles, this one would have have been called "The one where everything goes to shit".


	11. Chapter 11

* * *

 

A raven swoops down, lands on Cassandra's shoulder and waits there with a croak until Cassandra has untied the small scroll on its leg. It flies away as she unfolds the note and reads it. She nods as she reads along, her brows furrowed.

"Anything important?" Carver asks. It's the first time that they're speaking. Other than short commands at the last fight with an assorted group of rogue templars, mages and bandits, and the conversation with Master Dennet and his delivery of horses — Carver and Cassandra have not exchanged a single word.

"A message from Commander Cullen," Cassandra says curtly.

"Can I see it?" He knows it will aggravate her but he just can't help himself.

Cassandra looks over to him and her frown carves deeper into her forehead.

Carver holds her gaze. "Is it personal?"

"No, it's just about the state of Haven, trouble with the troops..."

"So, shouldn't I know about this too?"

Cassandra hesitates until she hands him the small paper. "I don't want burden you with the minutiae of day to day operation of the inquisition."

Cullen's neat handwriting swims before his eyes. "Are you sure that's it? Or is it rather that you run the inquisition and not me?"

"I'm not! Leliana and I — "

"-- run the inquisition, yes. I know that, everybody does. I'm just here to throw my hand at rifts." The little piece of paper crumbles into a ball in his hand.

"That is not true. You are the Herald of Andraste, this whole inquisition is in your name."

"Is it?" Carver yells, loud enough for every head to turn. Solas raises an eyebrow and slowly walks away.

"I'm... I'm not sure what brought this on." Cassandra looks at him, crossing her arms in front of her chest. "I have been called a traitor for supporting you, a madwoman, but I keep fighting for this inquisition because of my faith in you."

Now Carver feels like a child back in school in Lothering, when the teacher looked disappointed at him for not knowing some fact about how the brave Fereldans shook off the Orlesian occupation.

"Junior?" Varric appears at his side. "What's eating you?"

Carver deflates like someone has let the air out of him. His mind is in turmoil, and he doesn't understand it himself. "I just... who leads this mess? Who has the plan? Am I supposed to have the plan? Cause I don't. I don't know what I'm doing, as we saw at that last rift."

"That was a mess, we all agree with that," Varric says and pulls him into the shadow of a pine tree. He dips his head to Cassandra and she joins them in the relative privacy of the trees, setting her giant hatchet on the ground to lean on the pommel.

"That fight showed us our limits," Varric says, "and we're gonna learn from that and come up with strategies."

"Solas said my Herald-hand will become stronger, probably." Carver flexes his hand, looking at the green glowing cut in his palm. He shivers, it's even colder here in the shade.

"Then let's just put a mark on the map that says 'deal with this later' and come back when you feel strong enough for it." Varric looks from him to Cassandra, who nods quietly.

"The templar dose, it made me overestimate myself." He can still feel it, the song humming in his veins, eager for a fight. "How can I make decisions like that?"

"Ah, I think there we have the core of the problem," Varric says with a nod. "What do you think, Seeker?"

Cassandra looks from Carver to Varric and sighs. "I must admit that these implications have not occured to me."

"Do Seekers take lyrium for their abilities?"

"No, our abilities are based on years of rigorous training and a year long vigil."

"Sounds exciting," Varric says.

"Seekers can do terrifying things. The older templars have legends about them to scare the new recruits with." Carver remembers how the mere mention of a Seeker coming to a Circle was enough to throw the barracks in panic.

"Now I want to know what your abilities are, Lady Seeker," Varric says to her and one can practically see how he takes mental notes about this conversation.

"I can set the lyrium within a person's blood aflame," Cassandra says, looking at Carver.

"Maker's arse," Carver says quietly.

Varric leans over to him and mumbles, "Better not get her angry, Junior."

"I swear that have no intention of using my gifts on the Herald of Andraste," Cassandra calls out.

Carver snorts. "I'd be grateful."

"In my eyes," Cassandra continues more quietly, "you are the leader of the Inquisition and even if I may not agree with all your ideas, I intend to support you. The Maker send you to us to help, when we needed you the most and I will not ignore that. I'll discuss this with Leliana and Josephine, how we can make your leadership more official."

'That shouldn't be necessary', is the first thought that yells through Carver's mind. He shouldn't need some fancy title and ceremony to be a leader, he should just _be_ one. How had Marian done this? How had she managed to get people to follow her?

It had looked so easy, big sister gathering her friends and fucking shit up, but now, looking back, he realizes that _that_ — had not been it. Marian had been the same age that he is now, when she took care of the family and then the whole city and people had been listening to her. They had turned to her to fix their problems and she had done it, again and again.

Nothing is easy right now. And Carver feels so fucking young.

Marian, with her disrespectful self, big sword and hidden, weak magic, had somehow managed to lead and inspire people. And looking back, he has no idea how she had done it.

"I'm no leader," he says.

"You are," Varric says, "more than you think."

Carver shakes his head. His eyes are itching as he rubs at them. He will let them all down.

"When we have returned to Haven," Cassandra says with an unusually soft voice, "we will have to rethink what this Inquisition will be. I know you have many ideas for that and I will listen. We will also need to address your dependence on the lyrium doses."

"It..." Carver stops, the green light erupts in angry hisses from his hand and he clenches his fists until it has calmed down. "I don't know if it's because of the hand or if I just never paid so much attention to it but the lyrium — it makes it hard to think. It's like it's pushing me, forward, just forward, without question."

"This is troubling," Cassandra says. "During our training, we have discussed the lyrium doses the templars receive. We know it can be addictive. A Seeker can demand lyrium doses to be reduced as a harsh punishment."

"Knight-Commander Meredith rather saw that as regular thing." Carver can easily list ten names off the top of his head of templars, who had their lyrium cut for something.

"That is not— " Cassandra shakes her head. "That should not have happened. Our order failed the Kirkwall Circle. We received reports of Knight-Commander Meredith's harsh treatment of her charges for years but the reports of magical corruption were equally worrying. It was decided her actions were justified. If we'd looked harder at the root causes, maybe this whole rebellion could have been prevented."

Carver is about to interject with one of Marian's colorful tirades about the mage rebellion being inevitable but Cassandra lets the subject drop.

"I promise," she says, looking at him, "Leliana and I will do everything in our power to find a way of cutting that lyrium dependence. I'm convinced the Maker has sent you to us to help and I cannot believe that he would want you to be chained to the song."

Varric looks up to her in surprise. "That's a very dwarven way of speaking about lyrium."

"We had extensive studies about lyrium."

Varric opens his mouth and closes it again, obviously storing any further questions away for later. He turns back to Carver. "Junior, we'll get to the bottom of this, you're not alone in this."

"Thanks Varric."

Carver ties the shirt tighter around his neck and steps into the last rays of the weak sun. He takes the lead, nodding at the inquisition soldiers and Solas as he passes them and follows the path that would take them back to Haven in a few days. On foot, because Master Dennet wouldn't part with his horses right away.

*~~~*

Two days later, Carver has many choice words he wants to direct at Master Dennet. His feet hurt worse than ever and the weight of the shield has somehow aggravated a muscle in his left shoulder. He turns to Varric to complain about the lack of horses again, when they come over a ridge and movement catches his eye.

"What is that?" he says to Varric, keeping his voice low. Keeping in the shadow of the gnarly trees, he waves Cassandra over to show her the group of armored and armed people he has spotted. They are clearly templars, or rather ex-templars, which in itself is not unusual. But among them walks a bulky, oddly shaped creature.

"Is that a person? Made of crystals?"

Varric takes out a small spyglass from Maker knows where and peers through it. "It looks like it has been a person at some point and then it got overtaken by red lyrium and turned into, well, a monster." He sets the spyglass down and shakes his head. "Which is a weak description, I must admit, for someone who sees nightmarish creatures and demons pretty much everyday."

"I don't think we can hope for them to surrender to us without a fight," Cassandra says.

"I don't think surrender is in their vocabulary," Varric says and settles Bianca against his shoulder, his finger on her trigger.

Carver tightens the strap of the shield around his arm and unsheathes his sword. The lyrium hums in his veins, filling him with the urge to fight, and his Herald-hand crackles with green light. Maybe, just maybe getting into a fight is what he needs right now. Maybe then his head will be clear again.

The rogue templars attack as soon as they are in sight. Their faces are hidden behind helmets but the red light of corrupted lyrium swirls around their heads. They are even numbered against them but very quickly, the fight turns dangerous. These are not scrambling templar recruits, this is a well trained group of soldiers who fight without regard for their health.

At the center, the monstrous templar seems to bide his time. Red crystals grow out of his arms and occasionally he makes an unnatural sound that reverberates in Carver's ears. The song of the lyrium changes near him and Carver is drawn to him, yearning to attack him and cut the red lyrium from his body. With a deadly blow of his shield, the templar before him falls down with a snapped neck and the path is clear to attack the monster.

The bulky mass of the figure is slow but his hits are of a deadly force. Carver gets a few hits in but the injuries don't seem to disturb the creature. Varric's bolts keep hitting him, sticking out of his neck and shoulders but still he comes at Carver with the power of a battering ram. His shield cracks under the force of the red glowing sword. Carver steps back, avoiding another hit that would crumble his shield, feints to the side and buries his sword into the templar's sword arm.

Another bolt hits the templar as he pulls his sword back out but the monster doesn't even slow down. Like a mechanical automaton, the templar raises his sword, Carver barely gets his sword up to parry and the force of the hit rings through his whole body. His visions swims, the red lyrium shrieks in his head but with a twist of his arm, he gets his sword back up and drives it into the side of the templar's ribcage, where his armor is weaker.

The monstrous creature makes a gurgling sound, slowly dropping to its knees. But before Carver can react, the creature cries out once more, stretches up, and drives his red glowing sword into Carver's stomach.

"Carver!" someone cries out.

He turns, the glowing sword drops down from its own weight and he doesn't even feel hurt. There's just this annoying song, shrieking in his mind, his vision narrowing to a red glowing tunnel and there is Varric and Cassandra and some other faces and then the pain comes and someone screams and it keeps getting darker.

The song is shrieking.

Merrill won't like that song.

 

* * *

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> At this point, the story [Under a Blood Red Sky](https://archiveofourown.org/works/16576919) comes in, told from Cullen's point of view and bringing in the lovely OC Dasan.


	12. Chapter 12

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is very self indulgent. I don't know if anybody else wants to hear about templar life for Carver and Cullen but that's what you're getting in the first bit.  
> Second half features some game dialogue that I either took verbatim or changed for the dramatics. Gotta have dramatics, right?

* * *

* * *

 

_The creature has a distorted face, a grin spreading over it like a vertical split, the smell of rot and damp wafting behind it like a cape of smoke. Carver hears the screams of soldiers, falling under the assault of darkspawn. More and more keep coming. The darkspawn horde floods out of the Kokari Wilds and they fight and fight and they die and die and nobody comes, the troops aren't coming, there is no help, there is no hope, the king has fallen, run Carver, you have to run —_

_The house is small. Always too small, not enough light in the kitchen but it is a home. And now they leave. Carver can't stop looking. Marian takes his arm and drags him on. Marian tells him to watch over Bethany. Marian tells him to watch over mother. Mother cries in his arm._

_Mother cries. Marian is gone. Bethany is gone. The towering statues of the Gallows laugh at him when he steps through the gates, trying to save what little he has left of his family by swearing loyalty to the enemy._

_A mage turns to him, the mark of the sun burning on her forehead, dead eyes looking at him. "Do you need assistance?" the tranquil asks. He wants to answer but his throat tightens. He looks at the tranquil again but it's Merrill and the sun burns on her forehead, blinding him and her eyes are dead and her voice is not her voice, her voice is many voices and they are all dead and without love and the smell of rot and damp wafts around her like a cape of smoke and she says, "Do you need me to die?"_

"No!" he screams. Somebody holds him, strong, too strong and the voices scream and say his name, again and again.

"Carver, Carver it's alright, it was a nightmare, Carver!"

The nightmare dissolves. He is inside, in a building and Cullen is holding his arms to stop him from hitting him.

"Merrill." He lets his arms drop and Cullen lays him back down on a pillow.

"Who?"

"Nevermind." Carver stretches out on the cot and looks around. "Is this Haven? Why am I in the chantry?"

"You were hurt, you almost died." The candles flicker and make the dark shadows under Cullen's eyes even more pronounced. "A red templar got you with a sword of red lyrium and a piece of it got stuck in your... well, there," he says and points to Carver's stomach.

Carver lifts his shirt to examine the area of dull pain. His stomach looks like someone had cut him open and tried to stuff him with fruits like a pig for Landsmeet Feast. "That templar with the lyrium crystals growing out of him?"

"So Varric told us."

Carver looks around again. His cot is placed right at the altar, the small statue of Andraste looking down on him. In the flickering candle light, her face seems to move. "Why am I here? Don't we have a healer's tent?"

"The Herald of Andraste ill and fighting for his life," Varric says as he strolls over. "What do you think happened?"

"People wanted to pray for you at Andraste's statue and also at your side," Cullen says, rubbing his neck with a sigh. "All in all it was just easier to put you here so that people could do both at the same time."

Carver laughs and winces immediately. His lower body does not like it when he laughs. "How very practical."

There is a small table next to Cullen's chair, papers and books stacked in a precarious pile on top of it. "How long have you been here? How long was I out?"

"Four days." Cullen looks at the table. "Most of those are Josephine's."

"I better let her know that you're awake," Varric says and hurries to Josephine's office.

Carver tries to find a more comfortable position but as awareness comes back, the pain becomes more fierce as well. It burns from his stomach all the way up to his neck, where it joins a headache that has him clenching his jaw. "I don't even remember how I got into Haven."

"Dasan carried you on his Halla."

"Dasan?"

There is a faint blush spreading on Cullen's cheeks. "An elf, who happened upon us and offered his help. He also..." Cullen takes a deep breath before the next sentences tumble out of his mouth in a rush. "He saved your life. You were dying when you got here, no potion worked, he said he could help you. He's a mage, he saved you with bloodmagic, got the splinter of red lyrium out — I let him, I let him do bloodmagic on you to save your life. I'm sorry."

Carver has to hide a grin about the earnest worry of his friend. He doesn't know how much time Carver has spend with a bloodmage in Kirkwall and what kind of things she had shown him. "It's alright, better than being dead I'd say."

"There was no time for other options, you were dying."

"It's alright, Cullen, don't worry."

Before Cullen can lay on another layer of guilt, golden, blue, and red ruffles fly into his vision as Josephine comes running and hugs his head.

"Carver, thank the Maker, I was so worried!" She presses a kiss to his forehead and blushes deeply at her own outburst.

"Eh, alright? I'm sorry to have worried you," he stutters, a bit overwhelmed by the sudden display of affection.

A new voice chuckles. "I'm glad to see the Herald has woken up."

Carver looks past Josephine's ruffles upon the most beautiful man he has ever seen. He is a tall elf with long black hair, brown skin and the markings on his face seem to glitter golden in the candle light. The elf approaches his cot and kneels down to examine the wound on his stomach.

Cullen, who stares at the man with a faint smile that he probably isn't aware of, clears his throat. "Ahem, this is Dasan."

"My saviour, I heard," Carver says. "Thank you for doing everything you could to save my life." He holds out his hand and Dasan lays his elegant hand in his and nods. They both know what Carver says.

Josephine has gotten up and looks at Dasan with the same kind of smitten smile that Cullen wears on his face. When Carver grins at her, she hides a blush by turning away and picking up her papers from the small table. "I better get these into my office. When you feel well enough to get up," she says to Carver, "I would very much appreciate if we could go over a few letters and resulting developments." She smiles once more at Dasan and even Carver gets a bit of that smile directed at him. "I have new tea you might like."

"I will definitely come to your office for the tea alone," Carver says. He tries to sit up but gives up when another bolt of pain shoots through his body.

"Please rest, Herald," she says and hurries to her office with a smile.

Dasan holds his hand over Carver's stomach, a soft yellow glow emanating from his hand. Carver can feel the healing magic in the wound, gently encouraging fibres to knit themselves together. The pain changes to a dull throb, annoying but manageable.

"This looks very good." Dasan looks at Carver. "In a few days you will be healed and can travel again. But you should still rest to gather your strength."

With a nod towards him and a lingering look on Cullen, the elf excuses himself and walks out of the chantry. Cullen keeps watching after him until the doors fall close again. He probably doesn't realize what a dreamy smile he wears.

Carver grins to himself but spares his friend the easy mockery. "Has anything happened that I should know? Any new plans? Where's Cassandra?" He flexes his Herald hand. The green light glows softly in his palm and apart from the usual prickling sensation, it doesn't hurt much.

Cullen clears his throat and schools his features into a serious expression. "Cassandra prepares everyone for the arrival of the horses and the mages."

"The mages bring the horses? I don't think they know how to ride."

Cullen shrugs. "Maybe they can magic themselves into good riders."

"That's not how it works," Carvers says, scowling at him.

"Sorry, I'm a bit... worried." Cullen rubs his neck and stretches out his legs as best as he cna on the chair. "We don't have enough soldiers to escort a group of mages and a herd of horses separately, that's why they come together. When they arrive, we'll have a sudden influx of mages here in Haven, more than anyone here probably has ever seen before. Cassandra is doing what she can, educating people, but I'm worried. We're adding a lot of potential conflict to an already unstable situation."

"Cassandra is educating people?"

"Yes, she's holding classes daily. Mother Giselle and Leliana are helping her."

Carver stares at Cullen. "I never expected Cassandra, of all people, to support the mages in the Inquisition like that."

Cullen grins at him. "Do you know what the Right Hand of the Divine does?"

"Honestly? No idea."

"The Right Hand makes the Divine's vision reality. She doesn't need to agree with it but she will do everything necessary to make it happen." He smiles warmly at Carver. "She's now your Right Hand. Even if she doesn't agree with your ideas, she will make them reality to the best of her abilities."

"I'm beginning to like this."

"Don't get too optimistic," Cullen says with a frown. "People are not happy that more mages will settle here."

"We can't keep fighting among us. This needs to stop."

"I don't really know how," Cullen says. "You're asking for a lot and you're asking simple people to forget what they've believed their whole lives."

Carver sighs. "What the chantry taught them."

"Just two days ago, I had to intervene between mages and templars right in front of the chantry. Each accusing the other of either having killed the Divine or letting it happen. I'm sure Roderick still has his people here, spreading rumours. The people are scared and they easily believe things."

Carver lies back and pinches the bridge of his nose against a persistent headache. "Maybe this is all just a stupid idea. I should just keep pointing my hand at rifts and let the rest sort itself out on their own."

"No." Cullen looks at him with a frown. "You are changing things. I may not agree with everything you do but we need change." He stares at his hands, his fingernails dig into his palms. "I know I never was a good friend, I wasn't even good company. I was... orders, I liked orders. Did what I was told. I don't want to be that person anymore. Kirkwall has shown us where strict chantry law leads us."

"Took you long enough to realize that." He had been so angry and frustrated with Cullen back in Kirkwall. Everyday when he left the barracks, he feared that another mage had been turned tranquil and that one day, it would be Bethany, or someone else he knows. "How long would you have kept tolerating it all, if Meredith hadn't started her hot affair with the red lyrium idol?"

"I couldn't say. It was easy just to keep going. Being a templar was all I ever wanted to be. I wanted to protect people."

"But how..." Carver doesn't even know how to put into words how he watched Cullen turn away from the many horrors that happened every day in the Gallows. How the bile rose in his throat at his inability to change anything. "You must have known, you must have seen how other templars acted, Alrik and the likes, how could you close your eyes to that?"

Cullen stares at his hands as he is wringing and clenching them. "Kinloch Hold showed me the worst of what magic can do, it was... I still have those nightmares..., trapped by magic, demons taunting me. They looked like my friends, like a mage I was friends with and then they turned... I couldn't trust my mind, I didn't even believe the Warden was real. And then..." he stares out towards the door that Dasan has just passed through, "I wanted them all killed, all of them, all the mages. In my mind they were all bloodmages and I would never be safe with them alive."

"What happened then?" The Fifth Blight had not been kind to anybody and many spent months afterwards barely functioning.

"The Warden needed the mages to stop the Blight and Knight-Commander Greagoir and Grand-Enchanter Irving were sure that none of the mages would have chosen to become abominations if Uldred had not forced them. I — " he sighs, his fingernails digging into his palms. "I didn't believe them. But I thought if I kept watch over the mages in the tower, I could keep everyone safe."

"Wait, they assigned you to the tower after all that?"

"I just wanted to protect people. I was... I was horrible to the mages, suspicious, unforgiving. I think it even disturbed Greagoir and he eventually send me to Kirkwall. Maybe he thought I would get better there."

Carver groans. "He sent you from one nightmare right to the next one."

Cullen nods with a resigned sigh. "It must be different for you, you must have good memories related to magic."

"Annoying ones, for the most part," Carver says. "As a kid I was jealous how much time father spend with Bethany and then Bethany would just hang out with Marian all the time. Back then I didn't even know that she was teaching Hawke, I thought they were just not letting me in on their girl stuff." He grins as he thinks back to those days in Lothering. "But yes, compared to your memories, mine are probably better."

"Surprising that you became a templar."

"Bethany had been brought to the Circle and I wanted to watch over her. And it's not like I had many other options for a job," Carver says. "Still, Hawke was furious when she found out."

Cullen shudders, probably remembering then many disputes he had had with Hawke. "You were a good templar though, never had any trouble with the mages."

"The mages didn't have many opportunities to make trouble in the Gallows."

Cullen is silent after that, looking at the statue of Andraste. After a while he turns back to Carver. "Do you remember your first Harrowing?"

Carver lies back with a sigh. "Maker yes, what a nightmare that was. We had three that day. The first one chose tranquility, the second passed, but the third..."

"Demon?"

"Yes. And Karras made _me_ kill her. Said it's part of becoming a templar, a badge of honor."

Cullen nods. "I'm sorry. It's terrible to do that." He slowly unclenches his hands. "I was surprised that you asked to replace Karras as Last-and-First-Hand after that. Didn't seem like a thing you'd enjoy. But your harrowings always went really well, you were good at that."

Carver grins at Cullen. "Because I told them."

"Told them what?"

"I told them what to expect. As Last-and-First-Hand I took the last prayer with them and then I told them what the Harrowing is."

"But that's..."

"Against chantry law?" Carver gives Cullen a challenging look. "Yes, and that law is fucking stupid. You give a mage a huge dose of lyrium and without even knowing what's happening, all their powers get amplified. Do you remember how that first lyrium felt? How it seemed to unlock this power inside of us?" He watches Cullen until he nods. "Now imagine that as a mage, who already has powers to start with, gets all that amplified and then thrown into some Fade fight. Some of them were barely grown, they never fought a day in their lives! They didn't know what to do. So I told them. I told them of the demons, of resisting, of negotiating with Spirits— "

"Negotiating with Spirits?" Cullen stares at him in horror.

Carver chuckles. "Yes, you can negotiate with them. Spirits love to chat, they're very curious. My sisters talked to them often. Some even tried to talk to me but Bethany had to relay, I couldn't hear them."

Understanding dawns on Cullen's face. "That's why they were all so calm, I thought it was just..."

"My winning personality?" Carver chuckles again. "Hardly. It was still terrifying, even with that knowledge, some of them still chose tranquility but at least I never had to kill another mage in their harrowing."

Cullen shakes his head. "I realize now that you've always been a rebel. Your grand plans for the Inquisition make a lot of sense now."

The headache gnaws at Carver's forehead again. "I wish it was just as easy as that last prayer. Just telling the truth was enough and that was so simple. Now, with this mess? Hundreds of years of the chantry telling everyone how mages are dangerous? I don't know how to get rid of that."

Leliana steps out of the shadows and Carver wonders how long she has been standing there, listening. "You need to embrace being the Herald of Andraste. People need to believe it."

"I can't say that, I'm not..." Carver tries to sit up and gives up once again. "It's not like Andraste has spoken to me. We all heard that it was the Divine who called out to me and I hardly remember even that."

Leliana comes closer and her face, halfway hidden by the scarf over her head, is lit up softly by the candle light. She casts her eyes down and bows her head to the small figurine of Andraste. "If the Maker couldn't even protect his most devoted servant, his most holy representative to us, what good is he? Has he abandoned us? Is our lady still watching over us, pleading for our well being to the Maker? Or has she too, turned from us? You speak for the prophet, what does she say?"

Carver's neck turns hot and he avoids Leliana's accusing gaze. "I don't know. She's not talking to me directly. I'm sorry you feel this way, I wish I could help but..."

"But you can help," Leliana says. "You are the Herald of Andraste, you can give people hope."

"But I don't know anything." Carver cards his fingers through his hair. It has gotten long, soon he will either have to cut it or tie it in a tail. "I don't know what Andraste thinks. You want me to lie."

"Is it a lie?" Leliana's eyes are like daggers from the shadow of her scarf. "How can you be sure that you're not part of the Maker's plan? Can you be certain that the Lady herself did not place you here on her command?"

"I... Well, I guess not. I don't remember anything, who knows what captivating conversations I had with the Lady."

"Do not jest," Leliana says with a harumph that could have made Cassandra proud.

Cullen puts his hand on Carver's shoulder and looks at him. "If you can give people hope, boost the morale of our soldiers, the Inquisition will be much more successful. And if your radical ideas for change come from a Herald that people believe in, how much more willing will they be to listen to you?"

"Shit." Carver turns his head to look at the statue of Andraste. "I feel like an imposter."

"You're humble," Leliana says. "That's a good trait to have. We cannot assume to know the Maker's will. We can only try to act in the best interest of his people. Andraste spoke for us, pleaded for us and I'm sure this war and the Breach are not what she wanted for us."

Carver nods. "I get that. But I can't just go around, yelling at people 'I'm the Herald, follow me!'. It's dishonest."

"I believe you have been sent by Andraste," Leliana says and it's the first time that Carver has heard her say that. "I believe that your survival and your hand are part of the Maker's plan to give us options. He will not save us if we are unworthy of Andraste's love and mercy. We must prove that we can end this war, that we are worthy of fixing the Breach."

"Maker's grace," Carver says quietly.

"Yes, Maker's Grace," Leliana says with a stern look. "The Maker is testing us and Andraste sent you to help us."

"I don't know if I can bring that over convincingly." Carver looks to Cullen, trying to read his face. But his former Commander looks at his hands, hiding his expression. Carver casts another glance at the statue of Andraste. The way the candle light plays on her face, she seems to smirk at him. "Void take you all," he mumbles to himself. "Fine, I'll try," he says loudly. "I don't really like it but I'll try to be more Herald like, to give people hope."

To his surprise, Cullen looks at him with genuine relief, a joyful smile on his face. It occurs to him that Cullen himself may be in need of guidance, of someone to believe in.  

Carver lets his head fall back on the pillow. "I just hope this isn't going to be a terrible mistake."

Varric's voice comes from somewhere in the darkness of the chantry hall, "The sky is broken and demons are having parties outside our doors. I'd say it can hardly get any worse."

"Thanks, Varric, now I feel much better."

*~~~*

The golden gates of Val Royeaux glitter in the sun. The road to the gates looks cleaner and smoother than any road Carver has ever seen in Kirkwall and even the poor housings here, outside of the city walls, look as clean as Hightown.

Carver grunts when he jumps off his horse; he hates riding on a good day and today is not one of those. He still feels the effects of his injury, every movement pulling at the scar on his stomach. After riding for ten days, crossing the Waking Sea in a storm that had Carver puke his guts out, and then another ride of two days up to the capital, he feels like a darkspawn has eaten and spit him out again.

"I assume they're expecting us?" He stretches his legs and flexes his Herald hand. He had tried to pull a glove over it, or at least a gauntlet but it felt like it wanted to melt into his skin. And maybe, if he is to be convincing in his new role as a religious figure, the stupid hand should be visible.

"I am certain, yes," Cassandra says. "This is the heart of Orlais, our capital. Even if the templars have left, this is still the seat of the chantry. The city still mourns the Divine."

"If templars have left, who defends the city then?"

"They still have guards. But you're right, the city may be more vulnerable now. That's probably why the gates are closed, I've never seen them closed before. I assume they have informants all the way from the port up to here. They know we're coming. I hope our own contact finds us though."

"Why didn't Leliana come with us? This is her home, isn't it? She should know many people here."

"Leliana has lived in Val Royeaux, yes, but not permanently. She originally joined the chantry in Lothering and traveled a lot."

Carver freezes in his steps, the light reflecting from the golden gates blinding him. "Lothering? The chantry in Lothering?"

"Yes, she mentioned that she met you and your sister when you were children," Cassandra says, without noticing that Carver stares at her back in shock. Somewhere behind him, Varric is snickering and Carver turns to shoot him a glare.

"I know her, I remember now." As a young boy, he's had such a crush on the lively redhead with the pretty braids and her wonderful singing voice. But today, he has a hard time seeing that oft smiling girl in the hardened spymaster, who hides her face under a scarf. "She told us stories in the chapel." No wonder Leliana has always acted so strangely around him. She thought he would remember her.

"Any awkward stories you can tell?" Varric asks.

"Eh, no. She is a great singer though." Carver wipes a few strands of hair away from his face. He'd rather not indulge in any embarrassing reminiscence with Varric, as entertaining as the dwarf might find it.

"Maybe not the time," Varric says with a thoughtful sigh. "Did you notice how people look at us? Over there, two women almost fell over each other to get away from us."

Solas, who has been mostly silent for the whole journey, steps closer to speak quietly to them. "The Inquisition seems to have gained a reputation outside of Ferelden. One wonders how we have been painted here."

"And by whom?" Varric says with a grim expression. "Depending on who tells a tale, stories can be very powerful."

Carver looks at the glittering gates, still closed as they approach. "Will they even open the gates?"

Solas lowers his head and gives Carver a distinctive look. "And if they open them for us — "

"They can also close them behind us and trap us in," Carver finishes his sentence.

As if someone has heard them, the gates open to an empty pathway of decorative mosaics. The sides are lined with high walls and alcoves, each with a statue in it and green vines falling lush over the top. At the end of the path, an arch perfectly frames the top of the chantry with its golden spire. Carver can imagine how promising this path must look to worshippers. The heart of the country, Cassandra has said, and the city truly presents itself as that.

Someone runs towards them and Carver and Cassandra both move their hands to the pommel of their swords, but the person comes to a skidding halt in front of them and falls to their knees. "My Lord Herald, Lady Seeker."

Cassandra looks critically at the woman and then relaxes. "You're one of Leliana's scouts. What information do you have for us?"

"The chantry mothers await you but... so do a great many templars."

Carver peers through the archway to catch a glimpse of the courtyard behind it. "But I thought the templars left?"

"They returned three days ago, to protect the people of Val Royeaux." The scout stares at him, her eyes falling to his hand. The green light is still calm but Carver can feel it waking.

"Protect them from who?" he asks.

"From the Inquisition."

"What nonsense is this?" Cassandra calls out.

"Reputation is everything," Varric says quietly and takes his crossbow from his back, letting it casually point to the ground.

Cassandra glares at him and turns back to the scout. "Who leads these templars?"

"Lord Seeker Lucius, my lady. They await you on the other side of the market."

With a sigh deep in her throat, Cassandra dismisses the scout and sends her back to Haven to report that they might be facing complications.

"I know Lord Seeker Lucius," Cassandra says as they walk towards the archway. "I cannot imagine him coming to the aid of the chantry, after all that's occurred. And protecting the people against the Inquisition? He may have a thing for grand gestures but this seems hardly fitting."

Carver cards through his hair again, something is itching on his scalp. He turns his focus inside, for a moment tuning out the bustle of the market place they enter. There is a jitter in the lyrium song in his veins. Not enough to hear it but something feels just a tiny bit off.

"Good people of Val Royeaux, hear me!" At the far side of the market, a small platform holds an assortment of chantry mothers and sisters and a templar. One older mother addresses the crowd with outstretched arms. The noise of the market dies down, except for the occasional whisper of 'is that the Herald of Andraste?' Carver hears as they move through the crowd towards the front.

"Together we still mourn the killing of our Most Holy, Divine Justinia. Her naive and beautiful heart silenced by treachery. You wonder what will become of her murderer. Wonder no more. Behold the so-called Herald of Andraste." She points straight at Carver. "Claiming to rise where our beloved fell."

With all eyes turned on him and Cassandra looking at him expectantly, Carver raises his voice. "The Breach threatens us all. I implore you: let us work together and deal with the real threat."

"It's true," Cassandra chimes in, "the Inquisition seeks only to end this madness before it's too late."

The chantry mother pulls her face into a vicious sneer. "The Inquisition. Your heredic group of traitors to the chantry, bedazzled by that imposter of yours." She looks at Carver and holds out her arms again. "Tell me, are you really the Herald of Andraste? Do you dare soil her name with your presumptuousness?"

Carver opens his mouth but the claim to be the Herald is stuck in his throat. He cannot say it, it has never felt more like a lie. "I will not claim what I cannot prove. But I have been spared when all others died and my hand is the only one that can close the Breach. Whatever the Maker's plan was, there must be a reason why I'm here."

"Your lies will not impress us," the chantry mother cries out. She points to the side, where a large group of templars approach the platform. "The templars have returned to the Chantry. They will end your 'Inquisition' and the people will be safe once more."

The troop of templars steps on the platform but the leader walks past the mother as if he doesn't see her. The templar after him looks at the chantry mother and punches her in the face.

A gasp goes through the crowd as the mother falls. The templar, who had watched the mother before, tries to get to her but the leader holds him back. "Still yourself, she is beneath us," he says to the templar and Carver's blood runs cold.

"How dare you!" he yells to the leading Knight.

He looks down at Carver with disdain. "Her claim to authority is an insult. Much like your own."

He turns and marches on, ignoring Cassandra calling after him. "Lord Seeker Lucius, it's imperative that we speak — "

"You will not address me," Seeker Lucius says without looking at Cassandra.

"Charming fellow," Varric says quietly and steps up to Carver, his crossbow ready. "Anybody else feel like shit got real complicated just now?"

Carver's Herald hand flares up with angry green light and the lyrium in his body hums in a strange tone. He gives Varric a lopsided grin while he keeps an eye on the templars that outnumber them ten to one. "I definitely agree. But we're not dead yet, so we still got all the options."

Varric grins up to him. "There's the Hawke optimism I've been missing. Makes me feel right at home, Junior."

"I do what I can."

Varric looks up to him, suddenly serious. "I know, Carver. I know."

* * *

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oh Varric...


	13. Chapter 13

 

The glittering roofs of Val Royeaux disappear over the horizon as the horses carry them back to the port. Carver looks over to their new companion, Sera, sitting about as awkwardly on her horse as he did, back when he travelled with Cullen and Cassandra to the Temple of Sacred Ashes, half a lifetime ago.

She looks different than any other elf he's ever seen but between Merrill, the elves in the alienage, and Solas — his experiences may not be that universal. Cassandra doesn't like her, that much is obvious from how she looks at her but Carver thinks she's alright. He didn't understand half of what she talked about but she spoke of the little people getting caught in all the stomping and posturing and he kind of likes that. Someone needs to think of the common people in all this mess.

"Herald Carver, a word?" Cassandra says as she rides up to his side.

"Yes." Carver stretches his shoulders that seem to be permanently locked in tension. "I'm sorry I couldn't say it."

Cassandra looks at him in surprise. "I'm not sure what you mean."

"I couldn't claim to be the Herald of Andraste. I just couldn't do it."

"I didn't expect you to."

"Sister Leliana advised me to do that, to claim the title and give people hope. I promised I'll try but..."

"I think you reacted well, it was a difficult and shocking situation. You were calm and, according to the people on the market and the grocer who joined us, you did indeed give people hope." She looks over to the cart full of vegetables with a mule in front, which the fashionable grocer steers with the elegance of a royal guard. "I was going to ask if you want me to contact the Seekers."

"You hope that not everyone has lost their nugs like Lord Seeker Lucius?"

Cassandra lets out a pained sigh. "The Seekers usually operated in solitary and we received our orders from the Chantry. But with the recent fissures through the chantry and the templar order, these things are not the same anymore."

"When was the last time you received orders?"

"More than a year ago."

"Does the Order of the Seekers even still exist?"

Cassandra is silent for a while. "Since Lord Seeker Lambert has declared the Nevarran Accords to be void, we have been independent of the Chantry. Our last order was a Rite of Annulment on the Circle at Dairsmuid in Rivain. It was a terrible bloodshed. After that..." Cassandra takes a harsh breath. "I have heard nothing from the Order or from other Seekers. They seem to have disappeared. Lord Seeker Lucius was the first Seeker I have seen in a long time."

"That doesn't bode well for your Order, does it?" The pained expression in Cassandra's face tells him that she agrees. "Maybe we can look for Seekers you know better, like friends, but seeing how that Lord Seeker acted back there, I wouldn't want to expose us to the whole Order right now."

"I think that is a wise decision." Cassandra gives him a strange look. "I can't say that I had many friends in the Order but I'll try to contact those I know personally." She rides silently for a while and then looks back to him. "What do you think about Grand Enchanter Fiona?"

The elven mage, who had looked strangely ageless, had stopped them as they were about to leave Val Royeaux and invited them to Redcliffe, where the rebel mages have their base. "About that she thinks that Seeker Lucius caused the explosion at the Temple of Sacred Ashes? I wouldn't put it past him after that display of his and his templars. They punched a Mother, in the face!" He's no friend of the chantry but some things you just don't do.

"She's been advocating the separation from the Chantry for years," Cassandra says, "long before the rebellion in Kirkwall. I find it strange that she is now willingly offering an alliance with the Inquisition. Even if we have broken with the Chantry— "

"We still got that Chantry stink on us, yes."

"That's not what I— " she stops when she sees Carver grin. "Ah, yes, I see. Scout Harding mentioned that you're funny." She hides a smile as she pats her horse.

"I'm trying." He shrugs. "About the mages though, maybe it's less willingly and more desperately? Redcliffe isn't that secure of a place and even the permission from the king won't help them if the Templar Order decides to march on them." Something had felt off about Fiona. As close as he had been standing to her, he should have felt her magic, his templar senses should have reacted to her but they didn't. As if she wasn't really there.

Carver glances over to Solas, who hasn't said a word since that meeting and seems to be lost in thoughts. "What I found strange is how Solas knew who she is. Has he worked with the rebels before?"

"Possibly? According to Leliana, he's never been part of a Circle but he could have been in contact with the rebellion."

The nagging feeling he has whenever he looks at Solas, is just one of many that seem to share his headspace nowadays. He rubs his temples to chase an oncoming headache away.

Recently, his dreams are filled with symbols. The griffons of the Wardens, the Watchful Eye of the Seekers, the burning sun of the Templars, and even dalish looking symbols that he doesn't recognize. They all come up in his dreams, sometimes edged into an object, sometimes burning in the background as he stumbles through foreign worlds. It doesn't look like the Fade did with Merrill but these dreams are unlike anything he dreamt of before his hand started to glow green.

"Do you intend to follow Fiona's invitation?"

"We should at least hear what she has to offer." Carver looks at the green Breach rotating in the sky, visible even from here. "I don't see us closing that thing with templar swords. I'm pretty sure we need magic for that." He picks a small slip of paper from his sleeve and hands it to Cassandra. "What do you think of this invitation? Should we make a stop at Madame de Fer's salon?"

"We might not return to this part of Orlais for a while," Cassandra says, reading the elegant invitation again. "I'm afraid I don't know much about her, Josephine might have more information. I know she was the First Enchanter of Montsimmard before the rebellion and is well known and respected at the imperial court."

"She's a mage but not with the rebellion?"

"No, she and her followers call themselves Loyalists."

"Loyal to the Circles and the Chantry?"

Cassandra shrugs. "It seems so. They want to keep the Circles and stay under the control of the Chantry, as far as I understand. But then again, I'm not that familiar with this part of the Game."

"Oh yeah, the Game." Carver wrinkles his nose. "Josephine tried to explain to me what it means but I don't really get it."

"I'm afraid I can't be of any help with that." Cassandra looks at him with a rare, apologetic smile.

"I think I should at least meet her. It'll be interesting, I've never met a mage who liked the Circles."

*~~~*

The evening turned out to be interesting indeed.

A marquis in a silver face mask stands literally frozen in ice in front of him, his hand still raised in the challenge he was making. His petty insults had not impressed Carver but getting challenged to a duel at a party like this, in a most elegant mansion and surrounded by rustling nobles in shiny masks — that definitely was something else.

Madame de Fer descends down the stairs like a queen, dressed in white with a silver mask that doesn't hide much of her dark skinned face. She scolds or rather verbally kills the poor marquis with well placed insults and sends him running.

In a quiet corner, away from the tittering nobles, she introduces herself as the First Enchanter of Montsimmard and Enchantress to the Imperial Court. "As the leader of the last loyal mages of Thedas," she says, "I feel it only right that I lend my assistance to your cause. I'm well versed in the politics of the orlesian empire. I know every member of the court personally."

Carver weighs his words carefully. As impressive as this Vivienne is and as much as he would love to throw all the Game and Court business at her, her loyalty to the Chantry doesn't sit well with him. "I can see that you would be a great asset for the Inquisition. But we have separated from the Chantry and we are open to everyone, rebel mages, ex-templars and whoever else wants to lend a hand. We already have a large group of mages with us in Haven. Not many will agree with your position on the Circles and the Chantry."

Vivienne is silent for a while, her eyes studying him like a rare specimen. "I must admit I'm surprised to learn that mages are part of the Inquisition. You yourself are not a mage, you are a templar."

"I was, yes, but that doesn't mean that I agree with how the templars have acted under the Chantry's orders." He looks the Enchanter in the eyes, raising his chin. "The Inquisition will not further the separation between mages, templars and common people, not on my watch."

Vivienne holds his gaze and nods. "Interesting times we have. Great things are beginning, I can see that. I wouldn't want to miss to be part of it, my dear."

Carver smiles carefully and extends his hand, which Vivienne takes with a surprisingly firm grasp. "Welcome to the Inquisition," he says. "I will see you in Haven then?"

"Yes, you will, my dear, you will." Vivienne turns and leaves, greeting her guests with dazzling smiles and elegant laughter. Carver stands around, looking at the giant glass windows until a servant scuttles over to lead him out of the mansion.

Cassandra waits for him by the door with their horses, the rest of their group has already taken rest at an inn for the night.

"How was it?" Cassandra asks as they ride along the artificially winding path between manicured hedges towards the main gate.

"Fancy," Carver says. "No food though."

"I made sure the innkeeper put something aside for you."

"Maker bless you," Carver says to her.

Cassandra blushes a little and looks at him expectantly.

"Vivienne de Fer will join the Inquisition," Carver says. "She got all the politics of the Game down but was surprised that we let mages in. I'm not sure if her joining will be a good thing but it will definitely be interesting."

"Varric would say that this seems to be a theme with you, currently."

Carver looks at her in surprise. "Yes, that's indeed something he would say. So you _do_ listen to him when he talks."

Cassandra harumps quietly. "Please don't tell him, I'll never hear the end of it."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A shorter chapter for now but the next one is already half done. I decided to split this and make it two shorter chapters because it just got so jumbly, flitting all over the place. I hope it's a bit more coherent this way, even if it's short.  
> There will be a surprise in the next chapter so stay tuned!.


	14. Chapter 14

* * *

 

Haven greets them with excited cheers, doors and tent flaps opening and people running towards them, making the horses nervous. The horsemaster takes them off them with a frown and they continue to the gate by foot, the group of people around them getting larger as they get closer to the chantry. Haven has grown since they've left, Carver sees many new faces, most of them humans, farmers most probably, judging by their hunched over posture from years of work.

But also a group of elves has found their way here. For a moment he thinks he sees Merrill. But it's just a dark haired elf with fear in her eyes. Carver wonders what horrors she had to see, to seek refuge in a human village. Instantly, he worries what horrors Merrill is living through right now and the fear is like a knife in his chest. He has to ignore it or he would lose his mind.

The inside of the chantry in Haven looks pitch dark to their eyes as they go through the door. Cassandra halts in her steps at the same time as Carver does and they both go slowly until their eyes have readjusted. Golden reflections approach them in the twilight in the form of Josephine, her golden tassels and jewelry glittering with the candles.

"It's good you are back," she says as she hurries towards them. "We heard of the incident in Val Royeaux, a shocking development."

"We didn't die, so that's good," Carver says, trying to stretch his ass without being too obvious about it. How he hates horse rides.

Leliana and Cullen come towards them as well, causing an impromptu advisor meeting in the middle of the chantry.

"The reports I received about Seeker Lucius," Leliana says, "have been very odd. He seems to take the Order somewhere but it doesn't really make sense."

Cullen shakes his head. "It's a shame that the templars have abandoned their senses and the capital."

"Do we have enough soldiers to send a troop to Val Royeaux?" Carver looks around, wondering if only he had this idea. "There is a power vacuum there that the Inquisition could fill. The people need to feel protected. And we might recruit some more followers."

"That's an excellent idea," Cassandra says and turns to Cullen. "Commander, do you think we could spare a few men?"

"Also mages," Carver interrupts before Cullen can say anything. "We need to mix it up, have mages and templars and common people in the same troop, working together."

Cullen snaps his mouth close like a fish and takes a few breaths. "That's going to be difficult."

"I know." Carver shrugs. "But we have to start somewhere. We won't end this war by killing everyone else. That's no solution." He looks around at the worried faces of his advisors. "We are the Inquisition, we will not separate people."

Cullen groans, kneading the back of his neck. "You don't even know how many times I had to intervene these last tendays. There's so much suspicion and anger..."

"I know." Carver holds out his Herald-hand. "You said I should embrace the title, so I'm doing that. Herald of Andraste says: cut your shit out and work together. That's my message."

A soft snicker comes from Josephine. "If you'd allow me to rephrase that a bit, I think we can work with that."

"Yes, please do." Carver catches a smile from Leliana before she hides her face in the shadow of her shawl again, while Cullen got noticibly paler and Cassandra wears a strange expression of shock and amusement.

Cullen shakes his head and pulls himself together. "I take it that we won't contact the Templar Order?"

"If there even still is one," Carver says. "Can we send out a call that we're willing to take in templars who want to leave the Order?"

"We have to be careful though, they might try to undermine us from the inside by infiltrating us," Cassandra says.

Carver turns to Cullen. "Get your most trusted men and women on this, put them in command. They have to watch every newcomer, mage, templar, commoner — anyone could try to sabotage this. Also, you know that I want them to work with mages."

"I was afraid you'd say that." Cullen rubs his neck again and sighs. He turns to Leliana. "Could we have two or three of your scouts to find the Order and have them get in contact with someone, discreetly?"

Leliana nods. "I have someone and I might even have a contact inside the Order."

"You've been approached by the rebel mages, I have heard," Josephine says, her quill hovering over her notepad. "Will you accept their invitation to Redcliff?"

"It could be a trap," Cassandra warns.

Carver wants to roll his eyes. "So it'll be dangerous. I've been in danger since I walked out of that rift." His clothes itch with the grime of the journey, the scar on his stomach burns, and every single bone in his body seems to want to complain about some ailment. The only thing not itching is his Herald-hand, as if not even dirt dares to touch the green glow.

He turns to Leliana, "If you could get information about the mages in Redcliffe, how they are protected, how they support themselves, I'd be grateful." He has enough of all this talking and wants to get out of his armor.

"Yes, I think I can have something for you later in the evening."

"Good, then I'd like to get cleaned up now and I hope the kitchen has some stew left." He turns to walk away but a polite cough by Josephine stops him.

"If you could spare just a moment, Herald?"

Carver swallows a sigh and turns back to her. He can do many things but he can't be rude to Josie.

"Thank you your Worship," Josephine says with the sweetest smile. "I have a visitor waiting in my office who would like to speak with you. I'm sure it will only be a moment." She opens the door to her office and ushers him in. A young man in heavy armor stands next to her desk, looking with interest over the books on the book shelf.

He turns to Carver and bows his head shortly. "My name is Krem, I got a message for the Inquisition and Lady Montilyet said that I should wait for your return."

Josephine smiles at the young man. "No need to call me Lady Montilyet, my name is Josephine. This here is Herald Carver, tell him of your proposal."

The man blushes a little as he looks at her. "Thank you... Josephine." He turns to Carver and squares his armored shoulders. "My company commander, The Iron Bull, wants to offer the services of our company to the Inquisition. We are the Bull Chargers, we're well known for the work we do."

"I'm interested," Carver says, "but how do I know if your group is worth it?"

Krem nods. "Good thinking. We're finishing up a job at the Storm Coast, you should come and see us work there. We also have another contact who would like to meet you there."

"Another contact?"

"You'll see. Come to the Storm Coast." The young man bows to Josephine. "Thank you Lady Josephine for helping me."

"It was my pleasure," Josephine says with a little blush.

Krem gives a nod to Carver as he leaves the office.

Josephine looks after him with her head laid to the side. "What a nice young man. I would place his accent as tevinter, I think."

"The Iron Bull doesn't sound like a tevinter name though."

"Oh no, he's qunari," Josephine says. "His Chargers seem to be an eclectic group of people from all over Thedas."

"How do you know?"

Josephine smiles sweetly. "As Krem has said, they are well known, one of the most prestigious mercenary companies working in Orlais. I've heard from them from a noble family who hired them to guard their trade caravans. They not only eliminated the bandits but also found who leaked the necessary information beforehand. If we can afford them, they're definitely worth their money."

"Do I want to know how poor we are at the moment?"

Josephine shuffles a few papers around and then pulls out a letter with a colorful emblem that takes up half the page. "The Trevelyan family, who my family has good relations with, have provided us with a generous donation. We should be set for a while."

Carver squints at Josephine, trying to look through the smile she wears like a barrier. "And what do they want in return?"

Josephine's sweet smile never wavers. "Nothing of course, they only act for the good of the country. But we could do them a favour..."

"Of course we could," Carver groans. "Does it happen to be at the Storm Coast? If not, put it on the list."

"Of course, your Worship."

"I hate it when people call me that," Carver mumbles as he leaves her office. When he looks back, Josephine is quietly snickering to herself.

As he walks out of the chantry, nodding at everyone who greets him, Leliana comes out of her tent and falls into step with him. "Herald Carver, a word?"

"In my experience it's always more than a word but nevermind. By the way— " he grins at her, "I remember you now. From the chantry in Lothering."

Leliana smiles and looks to the ground. "It was a long time ago, you were just a little boy."

"I remember that you sang and told stories."

"Yes, I did. I remember your sister loving my stories." She looks up to Carver with a grin. "You on the other hand..."

"I loved them too, I just didn't show it." Bring an awkward, hormone addled teenager didn't help him much back then.

Leliana laughs and for a moment she looks like the young Sister he remembers from Lothering. "Those were different times..."

Carver sighs, he doesn't want the memories of happier times in Lothering come up in his mind because when they do, they soon blend over into darkspawn flooding the land. "What did you want to talk about?"

"The Grey Wardens."

As always, something nags insistently at the back of his mind at that word. As if he should know something about them but forgot it.

"I've been trying to reach the Wardens through my contacts and with letters to Vigil's Keep." Leliana shakes her head. "I even wrote to the Anderfels."

"Nothing?"

"Nothing," Leliana says. "As if they have disappeared."

"Is that something Wardens tend to do?"

"The Breach may not be a Blight but it's not far off. I had expected the Wardens to come to _us_ by now."

They've reached Carver's hut, where a slender woman comes out with a still steaming empty pitcher, promising a bowl of hot water inside that Carver can't wait to get to. He turns to Leliana. "What do you want me to do?"

"I've heard that you're planning to visit the Storm Coast. I've received notes of sightings of a group of Grey Wardens there that I hope you might contact."

"I'll keep an eye open. Anything else?"

Leliana looks at him amused, clearly aware of his impatience. "A troop scouting out the Storm Coast has been captured by the Blades of Hessarian. I hope you can find them and rescue them."

"The Blades of what?"

"I've put a few papers on your desk for you, explaining who they are and what risk they pose."

"I even get bedtime reading, how lucky."

Leliana inclines her head in a nod but Carver can see that she grins in the shadow of her shawl. "Enjoy your rest, Herald Carver."

He closes the door behind him with a sigh and manages to undress and wash himself, shovels a few spoons of stew in his mount and falls facefirst on the bed, ignoring the papers on his desk in favour of sleep.

*~~~*

"Your Worship," Scout Harding says, wiping the rain from her face, "for what it's worth, welcome to the Storm Coast."

"What a nice place," Carver says sarcastically. Already he feels the rainwater running down his back and the leather on his shoulders getting heavier with the water. "Does it ever stop?"

"Occasionally." Scout Harding says, "but not for long."

"You owe me for this, Junior," Varric growls as he pulls a scarf tight around his neck. "I told you that I hate this wet place and you still made me come along."

"I thought the rain would make you grow a bit."

Varric stares at him with a frown and only looks away when Scout Harding laughs out. "Don't encourage him," he says to her. "Next he'll think that he's funny."

Scout Harding snickers to herself. "Well, you could wait out this rain in the tent but frankly, it'll probably be over in a minute and then it'll start again ten minutes later."

"Might as well get going, we can't get any wetter than we already are."

Varric mumbles something unintelligible and stomps over to the box with potions and grenades.

Carver calls after him, "I buy you a beer when we're back in Haven."

"At least two," Varric calls back as he stuffs his belt with potions. "Make that three since you're not paying for anything anyway."

"Herald of Andraste drinks free," Carver says and flexes his Herald-hand. "This shit got to have at least one benefit." He checks his own belt and goes over to Varric to add another health potion to it.

Scout Harding beckons him under the cover of a tarp to show him a map of the area. "Your worship— "

"Maker's arse, stop calling me that, please."

Scout Harding blushes a little and nods. "Herald Carver, I've marked the camp of the Blades of Hessarian here. They are... not friendly, but good fighters. If we had a way of bringing them on our side, they could be a valuable asset. The fishermen said they met a group of Grey Wardens at the coast here, and here," she points to scribbled crosses on the map, "but that's been a while ago, we haven't found the Wardens themselves so far."

"Did you see or hear about a group of mercenaries at the coast?"

"The Bull's Chargers?"

"Yes. Do you know them?"

"Not personally, but they've been in the area for at least nine days. They should be at the coast, down that way, if you want to find them." Scout Harding points to a trampled path through rain dripping trees. She looks up to the sky. "Look, it stopped raining."

"Better get going then," Carver says and waves at Varric, Vivienne, Cassandra and the two soldiers Cullen could spare, Lupas and Michelle, to follow him. He decided to bring Vivienne along this time, instead of Solas, to see what she can do. So far, he's impressed that she endures the dreadful weather without any complaints.

After walking for ten minutes towards the sound of waves crashing against cliffs, the rain starts again. It hardly matters anymore because they are all soaked anyway. Except for Vivienne, whose elegant white robes seem to repel the rainwater. He should ask her about that.

As they come closer to the shore, the forest thins out and what little cover they had from the rain disappears. Nothing protects them from the gale hitting their faces. Carver pulls his scarf tighter but water is already running down his neck again. Rain drips from his eyelashes. But under all the annoyance, something else is pulling at his senses.

"Wait," he says, holding up his hand. "Something is here."

The two ex-templars nod. "Yes, something big."

Vivienne looks at them critically. "Whatever are you all talking about?"

"I don't know either," Varric says. "Cassandra?"

"You feel something?" Cassandra asks Carver.

"Yes, a presence, I can't describe it but it's huge, like..." In that moment, a creature rises up from the beach, flapping giant, fleshy wings. "A dragon." Carver stares as the massive dragon rises up into the sky. He has never seen a dragon before and this one is close enough to burn them all to sticks in seconds if it wanted to. Thankfully, it turns the other way and flies away over the cliffs.

"You felt the dragon?" Varric asks.

"I guess I did."

"Anything else you feel?"

"There's a rift not far from here."

Varric sighs. "Of course there is, I was starting feel lonely without any demons around."

"Herald Carver," Michelle waves him over to a boulder she's standing on. "There's a fight going on over there and at least one of them is a qunari."

"That must be the Chargers. Let's see how they fare."

The wet sand of the beach slows them down and by the time they've made it over to the skirmish, it's almost over. A mage in long, immaculate robes, slowly retreats backwards as he keeps shooting fireballs at the mercenaries. But his shots get deflected by a magical barrier that seems to be impenetrable.

The qunari, apparently now fed up with the lack of progress, scoops up a slender elf and sets them on his shoulders and charges towards the mage. The elf on his shoulders laughs and throws ice bolts at the mage until he is frozen solid and shatters with one blow from the qunari's axe.

With the fight over, Carver approaches the qunari, squinting against the sun. The elf still sits on those wide shoulders and holds on to one horn. Suddenly, with a joyful cry, they jump down from their elevated position and run towards Carver.

"Carver! Carver!"

He knows that voice.

The elf flies into his arms and hugs him tight. Carver looks down on her. "Merrill?"

"Ma vhenan, I found you," she says and looks up to him with a bright smile.

"Maker's breath, Merrill!" He can't believe his eyes. "What are you doing here?"

"Finding you of course."

"Your hair is longer."

She laughs at him and it's like the sun has finally reached his heart. "Yours is too."

"Merrill." He stares at her and it takes him several deep breaths until his mind catches up and he pulls her close and kisses her.

She wraps her arms around his neck and her lips are so soft and sweet and she fits to him like a piece of himself had been missing all this time.

* * *

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Surprise! XD


	15. Chapter 15

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Coming up: Worldbuilding and rambling. Lots of stuff that will become important at a later point but can't be revealed quite yet. I swear, I have notes, there is a point to all this, several points!

* * *

 

Merrill takes his Herald-hand and turns it palm up. He flinches, pulling away. He doesn't want this thing between them.

"Let me see," she says.

His resistance melts away when she looks at him. He opens his palm up and focuses on the green glowing cut in his palm. The magic light hisses, throwing sparks as it always does. But then Merrill slides her finger along the cut, mumbling words he doesn't understand and the hissing stops. The light calms down, the glow softly pulsing as she strokes over his palm.

"It's beautiful," Merrill says.

"Now it is. Usually it isn't like this." It reminds him of the soft tendrils of gossamer light he saw in the Fade with her. "What did you do?"

She examines his hand, turning it sideways and sniffs at it. "The color reminded me of something I found in a book recently, a kind of veil fire and there was this poem with it and it looked — oh, did you know I found books?"

A smile grows on his face, it feels like it has to crack his skin to undo the frown that has carved deep into his face. "No, what kind of books?"

"Old books, dalish, some even in old elvish or translations of elvish books." Her eyes are wide with excitement and the happiness in his chest just from seeing her so excited is almost painful. "The shems call the area the Exalted Plains and Hawke took us through there because — "

"Wait, hold that thought," Carver interrupts, "I have to talk to the qunari there for a bit and then I want to hear all about how you traveled through the Dales and what my sisters are doing."

After the short chat with the Iron Bull, he returns to Merrill and Varric sitting on a felled tree and comparing notes and drawings.

Varric points to a line on a hand drawn map. "Look, our shadowy friends covered quite some distance."

"We sailed to Antiva first, Isabela took in some cargo there and then we sailed all the way back to Cumberland." Merrill traces the line on the Waking Sea to Kirkwall and the neighbouring mountains and hovers there. "It was strange seeing Kirkwall from afar but Hawke and Isabela didn't want to go to port there."

"At least it was still standing," Varric mumbles quietly.

"Yes," Merrill says with a smile. "And there was no smoke, nothing was burning."

Varric gives her a reluctant smile and takes a few steps towards the shore. He stands there, looking over the sea towards the horizon. Somewhere over there must be Kirkwall. Carver can't say that he misses it much but Varric? Varric always loved the city.

Carver sits down next to Merrill and holds his map next to hers. "Why did you go to Cumberland?"

"Isabela had cargo to deliver there and also, Hawke and Anders wanted to go to the big mages place."

Carver looks on his own map. "The College of Magi?"

"Yes. We all went with them, the College is abandoned now and full of mage refugees. Hawke wanted to help them, we went there often. I made sure to stay at Fenris' side all the time, the city is huge! I thought Kirkwall was big but Cumberland is even bigger and so confusing."

Varric comes back to them, his shoulders held rigid. "I should have left you a bigger ball of twine."

Merrill smiles at him and takes his hand for a moment. "It would have been too big, it was better to just stay with Fenris." The rain begins once again and Carver and Merrill quickly put the maps away.

"Fenris went to the College of Magi? Voluntarily?" Carver asks.

Merrill gives him a strange look. "Fenris goes where Hawke goes. At least he did then."

"What do you mean, are they not together now?" Carver braces himself for terrible news.

Merrill takes his Herald-hand and wipes the raindrops away from it. The mark in his palm glows softly. "They love each other very much, I know that and they know it too. But Hawke... she's not the same anymore. And she said that Fenris was killing himself to make her whole and she doesn't want that for him."

"They broke up?"

"No, not really," Merrill says, closing his fingers over his palm. "They just wanted to do things apart from each other, until they will meet again with the Inquisition."

"Don't let Cassandra hear that," Varric says, "she keeps nagging me about Hawke and where she is."

"You can tell her that she'll find us," Merrill says.

"Let's keep that a secret for a while, Daisy. I'm not sure what exactly our Seeker plans to do with Hawke."

Merrill nods. "Fenris and Anders took a caravan through Nevarra, they wanted to go to Hasmal eventually, to help the tevinter refugees there."

"Fenris and Anders?" Varric shakes his head in disbelief. "Sounds like a disaster waiting to happen."

"I think they learned to get along," Merrill says with a shrug. "Hawke and Bethany got some kind of secret assignment about finding Grey Wardens. That's why we took the ship over to the Dales."

"The Grey Wardens?" Carver asks. "Really now? I wonder who gave them that assignment." He eyes one of the ravens with the red eyes in the tree above them, waiting to deliver messages to Leliana. How many of these ravens did Leliana send out into the world? "As it happens, we're looking for the Grey Wardens too, that's why we're here, apart from meeting Bull's Chargers and you."

Merrill stands up and shakes water from her hair. "Should we go then? Under the trees the rain might not be so bad."

Carver stands and looks at Merrill with a stupid smile on his face. "You're coming with us." He hadn't quite realized that yet.

"I go where you go, vhenan," Merrill says and picks up her staff.   

Carver smiles so hard, his cheeks begin to hurt.

*~~~*

As they trudge through the cliffs on foot because the terrain is too difficult for horses, they follow paths along overgrown dwarven architecture, towers, and statues. Merrill, untroubled by the rain, happily tells them of her adventures in the Dales with Bethany and Marian.

"After three days we found ruins, elven ruins! The Wardens had set up camp there but they were gone and apparently they didn't even look around because there were books there! Elven books!"

Carver eyes the heavy pack Merrill has tied to her back. "Did you take all the books with you?"

"Of course! So much knowledge, I couldn't just leave them there. With the orlesians still fighting in the Exalted Plains, they weren't safe there. There's also deserters, Freemen of the Dales. They burn everything." Merrill shakes her head with a sigh and feels for the pack on her back with a hand. "They would have burned the books. I already had to leave so many things behind in the College."

"Maybe we can get your things from Cumberland to Haven," Carver says.

"Oh, that would be wonderful," Merrill says with a bright smile.

A shadow falls on them, the sun somehow shining even though the rain keeps beating down on them. "Hey, Herald," the Iron Bull says.

"Yes?"

"If we go through there, we come to a fortified camp. Krem said you're looking for the Blades of Something? Could be them."

"Do you know anything about them?"

The qunari shakes his massive head, water flinging from his horns. "Naw, there were not part of the job, so we avoided them. All I can say is that, by the looks of it, they build good walls." The qunari gives him a nod and falls back to his troop of Chargers.

Varric looks over his shoulder to the Iron Bull. "Can't help it, he makes me nervous. Had too many of his kind trying to smash my head in in Kirkwall."

"Yeah." Carver looks after the qunari. The explosive conclusion of the qunari invasion in Kirkwall not only almost killed his sister, it also destroyed half the city. Watching this qunari laugh with his team is unsettling. "He's not a Tal-Vashoth, by the way, he follows the qun and is a Ben-Hassrath, a spy."

"He told you that?" Varric stares at him in disbelief.

Merrill looks up from the flowers she cuts off a bush. "Yes, he told me that too. The Qun leaders want to know what's going on and he tells them what he wants to tell."

"I seem to remember this spy business differently," Varric says, shaking his head.

Merrill giggles at that and Carver decides that despite all the rain and the constant drip of cold water down his back, this is now the best day of his life. Nothing will squash his good mood today.

The Blades of Hessarian are trying very hard though.

"You have to kill our leader," says a warrior with a pasty face, who caught up with them next to the impressive palisade that secures the camp of the Blades. "Then you'll be our leader and we'll be loyal to you forever."

"Until someone kills _me_ then." Carver stares the warrior down. "I thought you guys are the true warriors of Andraste, I'm the Herald of Andraste, shouldn't you be excited to join me?"

The warrior looks at his feet, scuffling nervously. "Our laws dictate absolute loyalty to our leader. As long as he has not been beaten in a fight, we have to follow him."

"That sounds very stupid." Carver takes a few steps back to speak quietly with his companions. "Should I fight him? Are these Blades worth it?"

Cassandra nods thoughtfully. "From what I have heard, they would be quite useful on our side and since they are considered by many as warriors for Andraste, they could help with our reputation."

"If the Herald of Andraste can't even get those Blades of Andraste on his side," Varric says, "that might put us into a bad light. Apart from the scouts they hopefully have taken prisoner and are waiting for us to rescue them."

"Good point," Carver says. He looks over to the Chargers. "You know, I have half a mind to send the Iron Bull in there to fight."

Varric laughs out. "And have those andrastian-down-to-their-smalls being forced to follow a qunari who is faithful to the qun? That's almost too cruel."

Carver sighs loudly. "A pity. Well, I better see who that leader is." He wipes the rain from his face for the hundredths time today. This place could be truly lovely if it would just stop raining for once in a while. Even his legs are soaked now from trudging through the high, wet grass.

Merrill comes up to his side and he notices for the first time that she's not barefoot. "You're wearing shoes."

She shakes her foot to show him the soft leather boots she's wearing. "Isabela gave me these. 'No barefoot elves on my ship!' she said." She looks up to him as they walk to the gate in the palisade. "Are you really the Herald of Andraste?"

He looks to her and shrugs. "Honestly? I don't know." He holds up the hand with the green glowing cut. "I'm just here, I have this stupid hand and if I call myself the Herald, people listen to me instead of throwing rotten fruit at me."

Merrill smiles at him but then she frowns. "They say that Andraste gave you this mark on your hand, do you think that's true?"

"I have no idea." Carver flexes his Herald-hand. If he concentrates, he can make the cut spark with green light. "All I know is that I can close rifts with this thing and nobody else can do that. So, I'm doing that."

"You can help, so you're helping." Merrill looks up to him and smiles. "You're doing good, Carver Hawke."

The warmth in chest feels like the sun itself as he smiles back at her. "I'm so glad you're here, Merrill."

*~~~*

The fight with the Blade's leader is brutal but short and ends with the man stumbling into his sword. Carver catches a smile on Merrill's face when that happens and he wonders what exactly she did with her faintly glowing staff.

The Blades swear their loyalty to him and Cassandra leaves a raven with them for further communications. They also have some more notes about rifts in the area and where they've seen Wardens but Carver gets the feeling that they would rather be left alone now to celebrate the death of the old leader.

"When you need us, we will come to Haven," Ivor of the Blades says. "But for now we will watch over the coast in your name."

"Fine," Carver says, itching to make some more meaningful progress at this dreadful place. "As long as you lend your knowledge and swords to the fight when I need you."

"This we swear," Ivor says and bows with his hand on his chest.

From there on, they continue their trek over the cliffs and along the coast, the rescued scouts coming with them. A surprising amount of boats bob in the waves at the shore and they pick out a few useful supplies like bandages from boxes in there.

"What are these boats? Where did they come from?" Carver climbs into one, noticing the solid craftsmanship. They don't look like boats you would cross the Waking Sea with but they do seem sturdy enough to take along the coast for quite a distance.

Krem comes over to him and hands him a leather pack with food. It crackles lightly in his hand from an enchantment that seems to keep the dry meat and bread in there fresh for a long time. "Look, your worship, this here has a templar symbol."

"It's just Carver, alright? Or Herald." He looks around in the boat and sees more marks that could have been templar symbols before the harsh sea water has eaten away at the paint. "Why did templars land here and where did they go?"

Nobody has an answer and that seems to be the theme of the rest of the day. They find notes and vacated Warden camps but no lead as to where they are going now.

Varric reads one of the notes as they leave an assortment of ramshackle buildings behind. "This here says, apart from how sexy those fishermen were, that they're searching for someone and that they feel darkspawn in the ground below."

"Right here?"

Varric points at a statue of a stocky dwarf. "With all the dwarven stuff around here, I'd be surprised if there aren't a few entryways to the Deep Roads around here."

"The Breach might attract the darkspawn and draw them to the surface," Cassandra says.

"Just what we need," Carver grumbles and stomps on.

All along the shore, templar boats show up and still no clue why they came upon shore here and where they went then. After many hours of useless walking, Carver sends the Chargers back to camp with the scouts.

They can move faster with a smaller group and with Cassandra, Varric, Vivienne, Merrill and two ex-templars they are well set for closing rifts.  

Climbing over sharp, hexagonal steles high above the shore, Carver feels a rift nearby and is almost relieved to finally have something useful to do. The rift twists near the water and he points it out to his companions, when the hairs on his neck stand up. "Dragon. The dragon is back."

The two ex-templars stare at him with wide eyes and nod.

"You feel the dragon?" Merrill asks, brushing against his side. "Is this new?"

"I don't know, I never met any dragons before." He looks down to her hands and sees faint glow on them, some spell she has prepared already.

"Are we going to fight it?"

"Void no. I don't even know how we would do that."

"I'm glad," Merrill says. "The last dragon I saw was actually Asha'bellanar and fighting her would have been a bad idea."

Vivienne, who has endured the constant rain and all the walking and climbing with remarkable placidity, steps up to Merrill and speaks for the first time in hours. "My dear, this Asha'bellanar, who would that be?"

Merrill smiles at Vivienne, unperturbed by her slightly patronizing tone. "The humans call her Flemeth I believe."

"Flemeth the shapeshifting witch?" Cassandra turns to Varric. "She was real?"

Varric clutches his hand to his chest. "Seeker, you wound me, why would I lie?"

Cassandra snorts in answer. "Among all your tall tales, how was I to know..."

"Tales. Tall tales she says." Varric shakes his head. "All my effort, wasted."

"Oh, stop it you dramatic dwarf," Cassandra hisses at him.

"Trust me," Carver says, "if those ridiculous stories involve my sister? Probably true. She always attracted shit like that like a dead nug attracts flies."

A tone comes from Vivienne that almost sounds like a laugh but surely that cannot be true.

Carver picks a path down the mountain side, trying to get to the rift without getting too close to the dragon. Merrill follows him easily, her feet finding hold where he slips. He turns to her, holding his hand out to help her over the edge of a cliff, even though she doesn't need it. "So Hawke never took you to the Bone Pit? There was a dragon there I heard."

Merrill laughs out. "Oh no, she took Fenris and Sebastian I think?"

"And me," Varric grumbles from the back. "That damn mine was almost as bad as the Deep Roads and it not only had a huge dragon but also these miniature dragons, annoying bitey things."

Carver grins. He only heard about the fight in the Bone Pit back then from people in the market. It had angered him that Hawke had not taken him along but he's left that behind. Now he just would love to know if he could have sensed that dragon too or if this templar-sensing-dragons thing is caused by the Breach.

As they come closer, the sound of the rift already reaching them with the wind, a bright spark explodes just a few paces away from them.

"What was that?" Carver yells as he scrambles back.

"Some dragons can shoot lightning," Merril says calmly. "They burn you alive without fire."

"Has it noticed us?" Carver aks, holding up his shield.

"No, Herald," Michelle says, peeking over the hill towards the shore where they had seen the dragon before. "It's fighting a giant."

"A giant."

"Yes, Herald."

"A giant?" he asks the world in general because this is all getting ridiculous. "What's next? Hurlocks in orlesian tutus?"

He crawls up the hillside and looks over the edge. The giant raises his fists and beats down on the dragon's head while the dragon shoots blinding balls of lightning from its mouth that hit the giant square in the chest. It doesn't seem to disturb him at all.

"I didn't know giants came this far south," Cassandra says.

"We're going to give this a wide berth, a very wide berth." Carver climbs down from the hillside and signals his companions to follow him.

"Through there," Merrill says and points at a canyon at the bottom of a dwarven statue. "I hope we don't have to kill the dragon. They're wonderful creatures."

"No objections towards giants?"

Merrill thinks for a bit. "I'm not sure what giants are. Are they darkspawn?"

"Giants never came up in templar training," Carver says with a shrug. "With the stuff these rifts are spitting out, I find that I didn't even learn enough about demons."

Three rifts need closing along this shore, one even far out on an island, connected to the mainland by rickety bridges. Vivienne and Merrill prove to be a deadly effective combination who leave almost nothing for Varric to shoot from afar. Cassandra, Michelle and Lupas slay the demons close to his sides and Carver can close the rift without interruptions.

"Almost too easy," he mumbles as he scoops up green demon slime.

"Andraste's dirty knickers," Varric swears, "don't say such things. Who knows what the Maker has in store for us now."

"Sorry." Carver ties the bag with demon slime closed and wipes his hands clean in the grass. Hopefully someone has use for the acidic smelling stuff.

True to form, on the way back to the mainland, a bunch of dragonlings attack them, which Varric identifies as the 'annoying bitey things' he met in the Bone Pit. Carver has to promise him to never ever tempt fate like that again.

Since the maps say that this was the last rift and Carver can't sense any more either, they can finally walk back to the camp and get out of their wet clothes. A fire is roaring in the middle of the camp and Carver wants to promote Lace Harding to Commander of all forces just for that. They sit around the fire in their smalls, woolen blankets draped over their shoulders and eat thick soup that should have earned Harding another promotion for providing it.

Merrill eats quickly and gathers her pack. "I have to make a drawing of that dragon and the rifts." She disappears into the tent and Carver looks after her, hurrying to finish his soup.

But Cassandra is faster than him and unfolds the map, puts a finger on Haven and traces a line towards it. "I would suggest tomorrow we head towards the north of Lake Calenhad. We should meet the Imperial Highway and ride back on it on the western side of the lake towards the crossroad that will take us to Haven," she says, looking at Carver for approval.

He swallows down the remains of his soup, throwing a wistful glance at the tent Merrill disappeared in, and studies the map. "Or we stay on the eastern side, ride on the Imperial Highway through Kinloch and Calenhad to the Hinterlands and stop at Redcliffe."

"But that will take us at least twice as long if not more."

"I'm aware," Carver says, "but I want to meet the mages as soon as possible. If we go back to Haven first, that will cost as more than ten days. We don't know how long the Breach will stay stable and we need all the help we can get."

"As you say, Herald." Cassandra nods, a frown on her forehead. "I will send a raven that we need provisions brought to us."

"Yes, good. They should meet us on the Imperial Highway in Bannorn Kinloch."

"Now, I won't keep you any longer, Herald," Cassandra says with a smile. She glances towards the tent. "I'm sure you have other things on your mind right now."

Carver can feel himself blushing and tries to hide his face as he gets up. "See you in the morning."

"Don't do what I wouldn't do," Varric calls after him. "And I better not hear any complaints in the morning."

"Shut up," Carver growls and ducks into the tent.

A lantern casts warm light and on the cot sits Merrill, tilting to one side, her chin resting on her chest. She is fast asleep. The quill has dropped from her hand and the open inkwell miraculously still stands upright between her legs. A book that she used as a pad for her paper has slipped to the ground, along with a bunch of her drawings.

Carver stoppers the inkwell and puts it aside and carefully places the quill next to it. Slipping his hand under her head and legs, he pulls her down on the cot so that she can sleep comfortably. She sighs, curls up on the side and mumbles something in her sleep.

Picking up the book and the papers form the floor, he studies her drawings in the light of the lantern. A sketched dragon stretches across one whole page and is surrounded by several detailed drawings of specific features like the scales, teeth, and electric lightning. Another drawing depicts the giant and the next image shows the giant, the dragon and a tiny figure that looks like Varric for scale. The drawings look lively but informative at the same time and show real skill.

Carver smiles at Merrill's sleeping form. He always knew that she was so talented.

As he puts the drawings between the pages of the book, another image flutters to the ground. He picks it up and turns it around. This one doesn't show a dragon, it's a sketch of him. His sketch version holds his Herald-hand up, the rope of light shooting from it, crashing against the crystalline form of a rift. The drawing is unfinished, rough lines depicting the action, the only detailed part is his face. He is smiling. He looks happy.

He puts the drawing into the book and crawls on the cot to lie down behind her. He pulls her close, just like as if they were back at Sundermount again, when she took him along to gather herbs and he was so nervous that he tripped over his own feet. Now, he's just way too exhausted to be nervous and too happy to worry.

He falls asleep with his nose pressed to her neck.

*~~~*

 


	16. Chapter 16

* * *

 

The rain still falls relentlessly. The path they've been following turns into an actual road, its edges marked by carefully placed rocks. Lace Harding and her scouts recently left them to move further along the coast to the east but the Inquisition troop and the Bull's Chargers make for a big group of people stomping along these old roads. The few horses they have trod along, they share them to give people a rest sometimes but they don't have enough horses for everyone and there's no horse big enough to carry the Iron Bull.

By now, the cliffs of the coast have mellowed out into the rolling hills of the coastlands of Highever. They pass by the occasional house and sometimes even something that could be considered a village, but all of them are abandoned.

"Why did all the people leave?" Merrill asks quietly. She sits behind Carver on the horse, leaning against him, dozing from the gentle sway as they ride. But now she is awake, watching the landscape. "They had houses, farms here. Why did they leave all that behind?"

"Maybe they were just tired of it all," Carver says. "First all the refugees from the south, fleeing the Blight, then darkspawn and Blight infection all around them. And now rogue mages and templars spilling over the lands. And as if the war is not enough, the sky is torn and demons rise from the ground."

"Once you know what a home feels like, it's hard to leave that behind." Merrill looks over to another abandoned house, its broken door swinging in the wind. "They must have been very scared."

Carver follows her gaze. The windswept trees, bent over from years of leaning in the storms, the way the houses all have their roofs down low towards the coast. The little lean-to huts with logs for the fire. The neat rows of elfroot and spinach in the gardens, now wilting from neglect. It all looks so familiar to him.

"I think I've been here before."

"On your way here?" Merrill asks.

"No, I mean long ago, when I was a child. Maybe not exactly here but in this area."

Cassandra rides up to their side. "I thought your family was from Lothering?"

"No, we were from Amaranthine originally." Carver tries to recall the vague images from that time but there's not much. But he remembers the years on the road, the long trek from village to village, staying at one place for days or weeks and then moving on again.

"For a while, we lived on the road, never stayed in one place for long." As a child, he didn't understand why they moved so much and where they were going but he never questioned it. It was even fun sometimes.

"As we traveled, father would take up work at a farm or in a smithy. Mother helped in the house as best as she could in exchange for us staying there. I think she learned cooking that way."

"She didn't know how to cook?" Cassandra asks.

"Mother was a noble lady, she never had to cook. She knew embroidery and such things and worked as a seamstress in Amaranthine. Father made most of our meals and then Marian helped with that. But there's not much sewing to do out here I guess. She had to learn to cook and housekeeping while dad worked. Marian watched me and Bethany and we —"

For the first time it occurs to him how much had been expected of their older sister. Bethany and he had been around six years old back then and Marian no more than ten. What a pile of responsibility to put on a child of that age.

A druffalo, that they freed from an abandoned pen, trots up to him, mooing, and pulls Carver out of his thoughts.

Varric rides up to Carver, looking at the animal following them. "We have a new friend?"

Carver grins. "The walking steak?"

Merrill stretches with a yawn and lets out a small giggle. "Don't be friends with animals you intend to eat, the Keeper always said."

"I'm not gonna hunt it but if it keeps following us..." Carver shrugs. "We could definitely use the meat, I can hear the Iron Bull's stomach from here."

A laughter like a rumbling thunderstorm comes from the qunari and he grins widely. "Good to know that you notice these things, boss."

Carver dips his head to him and turns to Cassandra.

"Solas should meet us before we reach Redcliffe, with two of our mages," Carver says to her.

She looks thoughtful ahead. "Do you think we need that advantage? The rebel mages appear rather desperate to me."

"I don't want them to feel _dis_ advantaged. Desperate people do desperate things." He has seen enough desperate mages to last him another lifetime. Mages who chose tranquility to avoid their Harrowing, mages that gave in to demons when they felt cornered. "I'm a templar, you're a seeker, they shouldn't trust us at all."

"I see your point, Herald," Cassandra says. She spurs her horse on and holds a piece of paper to her leg to write her message on it. Then she stretches out her hand for a raven. One of the animals comes flying through the trees and lands on her hand and Cassandra slides the paper into the tiny tube on its leg.

The raven rises up and then turns around and flies straight towards Carver. He holds his arm protective over Merrill behind him. The raven swoops by, the tip of its wing brushing his cheek, its red eye staring at him and then flies away, a small black dot disappearing into the haze.

The druffalo moos, possibly at the bird or at an exceptionally tasty bushel of grass.

"The ravens are creepy," Merrill says.

"I agree."

He stares at his Herald-hand, the mark sparking erratically again. He has taken his templar dose of lyrium early this morning, hoping that the effect of overestimating himself will wear off quickly. It seems to have an effect on the mark though, making it spark and hiss and hurt. Vivienne eyes his hand critically and he wishes Solas were here to look at it.

Merrill slides her hand along his arm from the back. "Let me talk to it."

"If it helps," Carver says with a shrug and puts his palm under her fingers.

Merrill murmurs something in that language he doesn't understand, a soft glow emanating from her hand. The mark calms down, he immediately feels the pain recede as the hissing stops.

"I can't wait to show Solas how you do that," Carver says. "He's going to be thrilled."

"Oh will he?" Merrill asks and laughs out. "That's good, some people don't like it when I know things."

"No, yes, I'm sure he will." Now he worries. Will Solas acknowledge Merrill's skill or feel threatened by it? He doesn't even know what Solas' opinion on bloodmagic is. Come to think of it, he hasn't asked Vivienne about that either.

The path winds over a hill and the ruin of a fortress at a lake comes into view. A few paces back, houses are huddled against the harsh mountainside.

Carver studies the familiar mountains and the glossy surface of the lake. "That keep looks familiar but the lake..."

"The lake is new," Cassandra says. "They flooded the old village during the Fifth Blight. Refugees carried the taint and were moved to the Deep Roads under the village. Then the darkspawn came up to the surface and infected everyone. They opened the dam to hold them off and kill the infected."

"Everyone was infected?" Carver wonders.

"Apparently, yes." Cassandra shrugs. "By the time the Wardens came through here, the village was already flooded and what remained of the citizens of Crestwood had moved up the hills to rebuild."

"What a terrible death," Merrill says quietly.

They get off the horses as the path winds up the hill, leaving the ruined keep behind them. It still rains, water keeps running down Carver's back.

"Rain... so much rain," he complains.

"Yes," Merrill says with a bright smile, looking up to the clouds. "Isn't it lovely?"

Carver's heart jumps in his chest and he can't help but smile. "Yes. Yes it is."

The path they climb becomes less steep and widens. Between the hills, grass-roofed houses cover every horizontal surface. Little gardens and decorated flower pots speak of a living community but as they follow the path through the village, they hardly see another living soul. A few children wave at them, before harsh words call them back into a house.

"Is it just me," Varric says, "or does it feel really cold here?"

"Do you want my cape?" Merrill asks him.

Varric chuckles softly. "Not that kind of cold, Daisy."

"Oh, of course, you meant how people act." She shakes her head. "Silly me."

"Nothing silly about that." Varric's eyes glimmer. "Andraste's arse, I've missed this. Never change, Daisy."

Merrill smiles sheepishly and points out a garden with beautiful flowers but Carver grabs her hand to hold it. He knows. Merrill always acts like she doesn't care that people call her naive and silly but he knows that that's all it is, an act.

"Hey," he whispers quietly to her, holding her hand tight.

"Hey," she whispers back, smiling at him from under her lashes. "Do you know why people are hiding from us?"

"No, I don't. Let's just find someone who can sell us horses and then we'll be on our way again."

A window opens in the grass-roofed house with the beautiful flower garden and a high pitched voice screams at them, "Heretics! Traitors! Go away!"

"So it's _that_ song, good to know," Carver says quietly.

Merrill squeezes his hand tighter. "Be careful, vhenan. They don't like you here."

"They haven't thrown rotten fruit yet, we're still good."

A man carrying a dusty sack on his back crosses their path, looking at his feet and pretending not to notice the large group of humans, elves and even a dwarf and a qunari.

"Serah," Carver calls out in his most friendly voice, "can we acquire horses and maybe some fresh vegetables anywhere around here?"

The man scowls at him. "You're that Herald they spoke of."

"Who spoke of me?"

The man wrinkles his nose. "Poncy fellows, goddy all in nicey."

Carver has the distinct feeling that Sera would understand this man perfectly, unlike him. "And they said what?"

The frown on the man's forehead gets even deeper. "Yourrey pretend. Not to be trusted."

Carver lifts his left hand to show the glowing cut in his palm. "I have this hand here though."

"Magic," the man sneers, holding up his arm as if he could shield himself from its power.

Vivienne steps up beside him, brushing some imaginary dust from her dress as she speaks to Carver with a low voice. "I don't think we can convince this person. I do have certain methods at my disposal —"

"—  and that's very much not what we'll be doing," Carver quickly interrupts, keeping his voice equally low. "The last thing we need is scaring these people with powerful magic."

The man sets the sack down, apparently now more invested in the conversation. "Thems were all mages too. Tevinter."

Cassandra shakes her head. "Tevinter mages? Here? That's highly unlikely."

"We send them off too." He grins viciously at that and Carver can just picture him, going after a Tevinter mage with a pitchfork. He's lucky to still be alive, if that was a real mage.

"Are you sure they were from Tevinter?" Cassandra asks.

The man looks her up and down, noting the greatsword on her back and seems to find her worthy of speaking to. What follows is a surge of words that sound like a demon's senseless babbling and Cassandra looks as bewildered as Carver feels.

"He's sure," an unfamiliar voice says behind Carver and Cassandra. Next to Merrill stands one of the Bull's Chargers, a dalish elf with a strangely formed and decorated bow that she holds in her hand like a club. "Says he knows what tevinter sounds like and they weren't afraid to use magic. Unlike an apostate would be." She throws a curious look at Merrill with her staff, but then turns back to Carver. "He also said that the mayor, Gregory Dedrick, might be willing to sell you something."

"Thanks for that," Carver nods to her. "Your name is?"

"Dalish, just call me Dalish." While she looks at Carver as she speaks, her eyes keep straining to Merrill, studying her, as if she can't believe she's real.

"Thanks, Dalish," Carver says and turns back to the man, who heaves the dusty sack over his shoulder again. "Where can we find your mayor?"

The man makes a dismissive gesture towards a large house and walks away, muttering to himself.

The mayor is just as unhappy to see them as everyone else and sends them off rather hastily with a cart, two draft horses and a box full of cabbages; all for an outrageous price that has Carver gnashing his teeth. But at least they can have some hearty soup tonight if they add fresh rabbit to the stew and the Chargers have a better way of travel now.

The cart hobbles along the uneven path down towards the keep and the small road that will bring them to the Imperial Highway. It's a bumpy ride for the Chargers but it doesn't hinder the Iron Bull and his companions in nodding off. Only Krem is alert, keeping watch for movement among the hills and the trees.

Naturally, Krem is the first one to notice that someone is moving along side their company. He alerts the Iron Bull, who wakes quickly, his one eye glaring but he keeps his head nodding forward as if he's still asleep.

The path narrows and cuts a canyon through the mountain range.

"They will attack here," Cassandra says. It's the most obvious spot.

"Yes." Carver nods at his companions, making sure that they are all aware of the impending attack.

The attack is as predictable as it is effective. Two swordsmen block the path in front of them and two archers appear on top of the canyon's edges. Another archer attacks them from the back and four swordsmen come running from the same direction.

Carver and his team turn back and attack the rear, an electrical arc from Vivienne taking out the archer. The Chargers rush with surprising speed to the front while Dalish shoots at one archer with her bow with something that looks suspiciously more like a fireball than an arrow. The other archer falls to an ice attack from Merrill, before she turns back and hurries to Carver's side.

They make quick work of the swordsmen, or so Carver thinks, when out of nowhere, the fourth warrior appears right in front of him and he barely manages to raise his shield in time to hold off his attack. He stumbles back, bracing himself for the next hit and pulls at his sword stuck in the dying body of the other attacker. But the sword is stuck and he can't move backwards without letting go and the warrior rushes towards him with a throaty yell, his sword raised high, striking down in a shield shattering blow —

— with a scream that dies as sudden as it started, the warrior crumbles, armor caving in on himself as if an invisible, giant fist crushes him.

In the background, a group of riders has watched the short battle and they turn their horses around to ride off. Silence descends on the canyon. One of the swordsmen lets out a dying whimper. Light from the setting sun spills through the canyon, turning the cliff face orange. The crystal on Merrill's staff pulses softly.

Vivienne takes a few elegant steps towards Merrill and looks her up and down. "That was impressive my dear."

"Thank you!" Merrill beams at her. "It's a drain on my mana but it's very effective." She gives her staff a loving stroke and the light in the crystal dies down. "Oh look, Royal Elfroot." With the small knife from her belt, she cuts the younger leaves and puts them in her herb bag. Carver knows that little knife and he can only hope that nobody figures out anytime soon that she usually uses it to cut her own skin for bloodmagic.

Varric looks after the disappearing riders. "Should we follow them and take them out?"

"Should we?" Carver looks from Varric to Cassandra. "If it were up to Crestwood, we wouldn't even be here."

Cassandra shrugs. "We don't know who they are. They could be people from Crestwood, making sure that we've left."

"Or they even sent those bandits after us themselves." There's an uneasy feeling in Carver's gut but he's not keen on getting involved in another fight so soon. "We ride on, use the daylight until we find a sheltered place to make camp."

Krem encourages the draft-horses, who had remained utterly calm during the fight, with a loud yell and the cart hobbles forward. The path takes them along the edge of the mountain range, leaving the cliff faced canyons behind. The landscape opens up into a valley with swaying grass and wildflowers. Fennecs jump over the path in front of them and Michelle shoots three rabbits as they ride.

As Carver looks for a place to camp, he notices a building at the edge of the valley, partly hidden behind a copse of trees. "Cassandra, what is that?"

"I don't know," Cassandra says, "I'm not familiar with this area."

It takes them a long time to get to the building, the valley is larger than it looked at first. Rocks are scattered in the valley as if a giant has thrown them around for fun and they make the terrain difficult to navigate for the cart and the horses. At least the rain has stopped and as the sun sets, it bathes the valley in red light, turning the swaying grass golden.

The building, an old watchtower, turns out to be occupied. Carver had hoped for a well to fill up their waterskins, but instead is faced with a woman glaring at him and blocking the entrance. Looking past her through the gate, he can make out a bustling community of people who seem to be living here permanently. There's a pot cooking over a fire and someone prepares several carcasses for the meal. Children run around, chasing each other with sticks.

"I know you," the glaring woman says. "They call you the Herald of Andraste for what you did at Haven." She makes a pause to intensify her glare. "Do they still call you that? And will you prove it?"

"Prove what?"

"That you're the Herald of Andraste!"

He should just say it. Just say, 'I'm the Herald of Andraste', and it would make things so much easier. But it still feels like lying and the words don't want to come.

"I cannot say..." he sputters, taking a deep breath before he continues. "I cannot say what the Maker's will is and if Andraste herself gave me this mark."

"I knew it." The woman snorts angrily. "Stories of you mastering the rifts are just heresy. Imposter."

"No, that I _can_ do, I can seal rifts and prevent demons from the Fade to come through."

Now the woman studies him more intensely. "Then prove it. Show me how the rifts bend to your will, like the will of the Maker. If you wield this kind of power, then you must be sent by the Maker and his bride. Maybe it proves the chantry's arrogance, that they declared you heretic."

"Who _are_ you?" Carver asks.

"I'm Speaker Anais of the Fire of Silence. Our community is made of true believers who have denounced the Chantry and know that the Chant of Light is a lie. We are faithful to Andraste and the Maker. It was arrogance to think that mortal lips could frame the Maker's will, and so we wait in silence.”

Carver looks at Cassandra for help but she only shrugs, looking just as confused as he feels. Merrill slides off the horse to join them, smiling sweetly at the scowling woman.

"The breach in the sky, what do you think it is?" Merrill asks earnestly.

Speaker Anais raises her arms to the sky. "The Maker himself has opened the sky. Soon, the chosen ones will be called up through the Breach and join him in the Golden City."

"And how?"

"What do you mean, elf?"

Merrill still smiles. "How will you get up to the Breach? Will you fly?"

"Are you..?"

Carver steps in front of the speaker, before she can wonder if Merrill's question is meant as an insult. "How do you want me to prove that rifts bend to my will?"

Casting a suspicious look to Merrill, the speaker turns her attention back to Carver. "A rift has opened in the cave, towards the back of the tower. If you can seal it, then I will believe that Andraste has given you this mark to protect us."

"In exchange I'm asking for your hospitality for my companions and me."

Speaker Anais agrees and the gate rises up for them.

*~~~*

The rift is easy, Carver dares to think. His experiences are not numerous enough to say that with certainty but some rifts seem to be harder than others. He doesn't know yet if it's because they got better at fighting or if some rifts spit out weaker demons than others. Having the Chargers at his side also proves to be very effective.

Icy templar power courses through his veins as he stuns a demon with _Wrath of Heaven_ , using his sword to focus. It burns up in a fireball before he can ready the next power. His sword slices through another demon rising out of the ground in front of him but the battle is under control as far as he can see. Taking a measured step towards the crystal shape of the rift, he raises his hand high, making sure that Speaker Anais and her followers see how the golden rope of light shoots from his hand, hitting the crystalline structure. He pulls at it with his mind, letting it feed off his own life force, until it cracks and collapses in on itself.

His Herald-hand burns but the warmth is welcome as it chases the iciness from his veins. He sways on his feet, the drain of the mark taking its toll. Merrill takes his marked hand and holds the cut to her lips, whispering softly to it, numbing the pain. Her other hand is on his cheek and warmth is spreading from it. Suddenly, it's easier to breathe.

The Fire of Silence people are cheering at them, calling Carver saviour and Herald of Andraste. They lead them to a secluded washhouse, offering clean towels with deep bows. The water in the basins is even warm, and through the curtain separating the washrooms, they can hear each other's happy sighs and playful splashing as they clean up.

Clean and rejuvenated, they return to a large table with steaming bowls of hearty soup.

"Your dalish friends have kindly given us three rabbits for the stew," Speaker Anais says as they finish eating. "It's not often that we see the dalish around here and rarely are they willing to share their food with us."

Merrill lays her head to the side and places the spoon next to her empty bowl. "Most dalish clans love to share food if it's a mutual arrangement."

"Our supplies here are quite limited," Anais says. "We don't have the whole land as our hunting grounds, we can't just give food away."

Dalish snorts and shoves the bowl away. "You don't say." She gets up, rattling the table with the urgency of getting away and stomps off.

Merrill watches after Dalish as she leaves the tower through the main gate, her fingers playing with the hem of her tunic.

A group of children runs around the table, waving wooden swords and staffs. "I smite you!" yells one of the sword bearers.

"You missed, now I'll throw a fireball at you," a boy with a long stick yells back.

"I'm a templar, I'm too strong for you!" The sword boy pokes the other boy with his wooden sword. "Now you die, filthy mage."

The other boy drops his stick and dramatically stumbles backwards, only to get back up shortly afterwards. "I don't wanna be a mage anymore, it's my turn to be a templar."

"No, I'm the templar, you have to be the mage."

"I don't wanna be a stupid mage anymore."

"But you have to!"

"Children," Anais scolds, "go play elsewhere."

Merril gets up quietly. "I think I'll go and see what Dalish does."

Carver watches her as she walks out of the gate, proudly holding her staff in her hand. Someone offers to refill his bowl with soup but he has lost his appetite.

Varric leans over to him. "Funny how the taste of soup varies with the company."

"Maker yes," Carver says quietly. "We'll be setting up camp far away from here."

*~~~*

It's getting dark by the time they find a place to set up their tents. Someone builds a fire in the middle to ward off wild animals but not many linger in its warming circle. A guard schedule is set and for once, Carver is grateful to opt out of a shift. He is exhausted.

The Chargers pile into two tents, there seems to be a ranking list who gets to sleep with the Iron Bull and judging by the noises, there are certain benefits to that position. Cassandra turns bright red upon listening to the joyful sighs and excuses herself quickly. Varric just grins and writes a few notes before he also bids him goodnight.

Carver stares into the fire, musing over the day.

Merrill comes to him on near silent feet, wrapping her arms around him and draws his back to her chest. "Vhenan, you need sleep."

Carver leans his head back, looking up to her. "It's not fair."

"What isn't fair?"

"How they treat you. How they talk about you, about dalish elves, about mages." He looks back to the fire, watching the flames lick over the wood. "I don't know how to change it all."

Merrill presses a kiss to the top of his head. "I know you will change a lot of things." Her hands stroke over his chest and she leans further down to whisper in his ear. "But now is not the time to worry about that."

"Oh." It's very hot all of a sudden under Carver's shirt.

Merrill takes his hand and waits for him to get up, smiling at him. "Come, we have a tent all to ourselves."

"Oh, yes." He scrambles to get up, almost pulling Merrill off her feet in the process.

She just laughs and wraps her arm around his waist to lead him to their tent. Suddenly she halts, staring straight ahead. "We forgot something."

"What?"

"The druffalo."

"What druffalo?" Carver wonders, his thoughts already on very different things. "Oh _that_ druffalo."

"It probably got scared and ran away when the bandits attacked us." Merrill steps towards the tent and holds the flap open for Carver to slip in. "I hope it finds a friend."

"Do we have to talk about the druffalo right now?" Carver asks sheepishly.

The way Merrill kisses him, straddles him and how her body molds to his, is answer enough to that question.


End file.
